Stem cell therapy is a viable strategy in treating heart disease, but it is still undergoing research; therefore, healthcare professionals should be cautious in pursuing it as a treatment option. There are positive prospects about the curative approach, but there is no conclusive evidence on its effect on heart disease patients. Terzic and Behfar (2016) note that the use of stem cells shows promise in regeneration, but due to the varied outcomes, it creates difficulty for professionals in adopting it to health practice. Until there is explicit evidence on cardiac reparative proficiency, stem cell therapy can only undergo more research before being pursued as a treatment technique for heart disease.
The heterogeneous efficacy is due to the various issues revolving around this therapy. Hoover-Plow and Gong (2012) indicate that stem cell therapy is impeded by poor identification and enrolment of autologous stem cells. Poor survival of stem cells, lack of mobilizing and homing agents to enhance stem cell recruitment, and unreliable strategies of engrafting sources of stem cells are the other challenges. As a result, scientists have not addressed these issues using a holistic approach while conducting their research; hence, limiting optimization of the process.
Stem cell therapy is proposed to be a promising treatment option for myocardial infarction, cardiomyopathy, cardiomyoplasty, heart damage due to angiogenesis, and ischemic heart disease (Hoover-Plow and Gong, 2012; Lee et al., 2016). Stem cell therapy is postulated to reduce health care costs due to prolonged treatment and improve quality of life and extant health structures. The treatment approach, nonetheless, is considered to be a solution for addressing health disparities; hence, promoting social justice and equity in health, as noted by Ellison (2016). As indicated by Jadczyk et al. (2013), the regeneration technique is deemed to restore heart functionality and provide mode effective outcomes. In this, it is opposed to current palliative strategies that merely seek to attain residual cardiac function.
References
Ellison, B. (2016). Stem cell research and social justice: Aligning scientific progress with social need. Current Stem Cell Reports, 2, 328–335. Web.
Hoover-Plow, J., & Gong, Y. (2012). Challenges for heart disease stem cell therapy. Vascular Health and Risk Management, 8, 99–113. Web.
Jadczyk, T., Faulkner, A., & Madeddu, P. (2013). Stem cell therapy for cardiovascular disease: The demise of alchemy and rise of pharmacology. British Journal of Pharmacology, 169(2), 247–268. Web.
Lee, C. Y., Kim, R., Ham, O., Lee, J., Kim, P., Lee, S., Oh, S., Lee, H., Lee, M., Kim, J., & Chang, W. (2016). Therapeutic potential of stem cells strategy for cardiovascular diseases. Stem Cells International, 2016, 4285938. Web.
Terzic, A., & Behfar, A. (2016). Stem cell therapy for heart failure: Ensuring regenerative proficiency. Trends in Cardiovascular Medicine, 26(5), 395–404.