BBC News - Stem cell treatment for horses to be trialled on humans
“No-one has ever put a stem cell into a human Achilles tendon before in the UK,” says Andy Goldberg, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital. "
But all of that is about to change.
Dr Goldberg is leading the first trial of a new treatment which has been working wonders in racehorses - and could produce the same results in humans.
The stem cell treatment for what’s known as “tendinopathy” in racehorses has been so successful that one horse to receive the treatment, Dream Alliance, went on to win the 2009 Welsh Grand National.
The technique also saw the re-injury rate of the treated horses fall by 50%.
In humans, the condition is called Achilles tendinopathy and causes severe pain in the heel. About 85,000 people are affected by the problem in the UK each year.
At present there are limited options for treating the condition apart from surgery, but stem cells offer a different solution because of their ability to regenerate.
Exploring the use of stem cell treatments in racehorses provided the perfect test-bed for humans because, Dr Goldberg says, “horses have similar problems to tendon problems found in humans”.
“Their injuries are akin to human injuries. We’ve been able to solve the problem in horses so the next step is to translate it into humans,” he says.
**Interesting article , what are your thoughts? **