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[Hankook Ilbo Health Prism] Do Not Carelessly Get Illegal Stem Cell Injections

By 2016-12-06No Comments



[Health Prism] Do Not Carelessly Get Illegal Stem Cell Injections








Recently, as suspicions emerged that President Park Geun-hye received stem cell injections, a controversy over illegal medical procedures is arising.

 

Along with this, speculative articles regarding stem cells that lack medical basis and are unverified are rampant and being amplified.



First, it must be confirmed whether the injection received by the President was a stem cell injection or a simple placenta injection. If the injection was a stem cell injection, it is presumed to be one of three types: umbilical cord stem cells, bone marrow stem cells, or adipose-derived stem cells.


First, cord blood stem cell injection is a method in which stem cells are extracted from cord blood stored at a stem cell research institute, cultured, and then injected. It is a method preferred by the general public because it is convenient to administer. However, the export and use of cord blood stem cells are prohibited except for research purposes.


Next, regarding bone marrow stem cells, since the amount of stem cells extracted from the bone marrow is very small, they are cultured before being injected into the patient. In this case, the patient must undergo the arduous process of collecting bone marrow fluid and requires a culture period. Most stem cell therapies approved in Korea fall into this category. However, culturing and injecting cells without being approved as a therapeutic agent is illegal.


Finally, in the case of adipose-derived stem cells, the process of extracting fat, the material, from the body is required, and likewise, it is illegal to inject the extracted stem cells through a culture process without the approval of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety as a therapeutic agent.


However, if a sufficient amount of fat is harvested from a patient's body within the hospital, sufficient stem cells are extracted from it, and a procedure such as stem cell cosmetic surgery is performed directly on the patient without undergoing processes like culture, it is a legal procedure recognized as a medical act.


The important point here is that since in-hospital stem cell procedures do not involve a culture process, extracting a sufficient number of stem cells to achieve optimal effects requires equipment capable of proper extraction and sufficient experience in operating it, as the extraction yield varies widely depending on the equipment.


In order to extract fat from a patient's body and extract stem cells to perform the procedure on the patient, if the procedure is not performed within 2 hours of extraction, the extracted stem cells begin to disappear, so if the procedure is delayed beyond that, there is no point in performing the stem cell procedure.


Considering these various circumstances, if we assume that the President received a stem cell injection, it is reasonable to assume that he received cultured stem cells; in such a case, if the procedure was performed at an unauthorized institution using a product not approved as a treatment, it could be classified as an illegal procedure.


If a patient undergoes the procedure through such an illegal culture process, it is classified as illegal because, even if the patient achieves the effects of the stem cell treatment and is satisfied, there is no verification of the possibility of cell mutation, contamination, or alteration, which can be dangerous to the patient.