I just received an email and phone call from Canada Blood Services letting me know that I am a possible match for stem cell donation. Just curious how stem cells help.
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To word it legitimately as basically as possible, stem cells are building blocks in the body that form every other specialized cell in the body – brain cells, blood cells, etc. Researching how they form more specialized cells is insanely valuable to learn how genetic diseases, cancer, etc. are formed. It’s a raw human material needed to solve countless diseases and advancements in biological science.
Stem cells are what all cells in your body are before they became your organs and everything (they are the stem from which your body grows). As your body develops, they differentiate into all of the organs, which then grow into you. Whether it’s your liver, skin, nerves, eyes brain, at one point they were all stem cells.
Adult stem cells eventually lose their ability to differentiate and just kind of exist, but we have recently learned how to make them differentiate again. This gives us the ability to heal wounds we thought weren’t possible before by literally rebuilding the structure.
The harvesting process for stem cells is also very easy. They just take your blood and filter out the stem cells.
Well, i am suffering from leukemia. My bone marrow has stopped working and is not producing blood cells correctly. The bad blood cells are replacing my good cells such as my platelets, hemoglobin and white blood cells. This means i am anemic, can’t clot and my immune system is not working. I am waiting on a stem cell transplant that will allow the doctors to replace my broke ass bone marrow with the donors so i have the ability to produce different blood cells properly. This is a layman’s explanation.
Stem cells are cells that can change into other cells as necessary for the body. They’re very good at signaling and aiding in healing, and because they are living cells they’re much more adaptable than traditional medicine (which is usually just one or a few chemicals). A big use for them is that the body will decide certain chronic wounds (i.e. wounds that have been open a long time) aren’t worth trying to heal anymore, but stem cells can be used to help turn the body’s healing process back on.
Additionally, as previously stated they can become a bunch of different cell types. This includes nerve cells, so they can possibly be used to bridge the gap in cases of paralysis or neuro-degenerative diseases (though these are still being tested and not publicly available).
The one issue with stem cells is that, while they do seem to behave the way researchers want them to in the body with shocking consistency, a mistake or lack of understanding could see the stem cells accidentally start forming the wrong tissue, which isn’t great (we don’t want bone where muscle or fat is supposed to be, for example).
Did that help at all?
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