Another example of the inevitable triumph of stem cells...
Cleveland, Ohio (CNN) -- Diana Tirpak was so sure her leukemia was going to kill her, she bought a suit for her husband, Jake, to wear at her funeral.
"I was bound and determined he was going to look fine at the funeral," says Tirpak, 68, a retired school nurse in Hudson, Ohio.
Until recently, Tirpak would have faced a death sentence without a bone marrow transplant. But Tirpak's physician, Dr. Mary Laughlin, turned to something deemed medical waste until recently: umbilical cord blood.
Medical tourism is a billion dollar industry and it's started to expand into marketing stem cell therapies.
You can’t keep a good thing down. When the US restricted stem cell research in the early part of the century that research didn’t die, it emigrated. All over the world, scientists continued to explore the efficacies of embryonic and adult stem cells with astonishing results. Now, as the public becomes increasingly aware of these “miracle” treatments, the demand for stem cell therapies has increased far beyond what institutionalized Western medicine seems able to immediately provide. The result is both exhilarating and terrifying: more and more patients from the US and Europe are traveling abroad to seek stem cell treatments. This is just a tiny fraction of the ever increasing flood of medical tourism that has struck the West. Companies like Atlanta based Global Surgery Providers (GSP) are marketing directly to patients, facilitating travel for medical procedures including stem cell transplants. While governments, doctors, and patients are still struggling to understand the dangers and advantages of medical tourism, it continues to grow. One thing is for certain, no matter what any one institution may try to do to control the use of stem cells, the demand for this technology is too strong to be stopped.
While many researchers are working overtime to get stem cell therapies safely to market, the public perception in the US is that this technology is stalled. It doesn’t help that big name studies, like the first US embryonic test by Geron, have run into bureaucratic roadblocks even after the political ones were pulled away. When the US allows stem cell treatments for animals, but not humans, this is seen as backwards, not as a necessary result of the stringent review applied to new medicine. It takes time for any new product to pass FDA approval, but patients want stem cells now.
Which is where medical tourism comes in. Why wait years for the resolution of clinical trials and bureaucratic red tape when you can jump on a plane and get treated in a manner of weeks? Atlanta’s GSP is just one of many medical travel agencies that has picked up on the stem cell trend. They offer consultations (via phone only at this time) that could help you find a stem cell therapy center somewhere across the world. Similar agencies cater to the UK, Canada, and many different locations in Europe.
When you see a company offering to take you to a foreign country for a miraculous new medical procedure, it can all seem new and untested. Parts of it are. Yet the medical tourism industry has been growing strong for years now. Once the province of cosmetic surgeries and dental procedures, medical tourism now includes those looking for hip/joint replacement, heart surgery, even organ transplant. Some 750,000 Americans were thought to have traveled outside the US for medical treatment in 2007. A survey published by Deloitte in 2009 found that 3% of those 3000 18 to 75 year old Americans polled had used some form of medical tourism and that 27% would consider it (see page 13 of the results). A significant 40% would pursue medical travel if they could save 50% or more on costs.
Cost and availability top the list of reasons why people seek healthcare travel. In the US, a heart valve operation might run you $200k, but the same procedure in India could be done for $10k, including travel and accommodations. In countries with socialized medicine, waiting for months on necessary (but not “critical”) surgery pushes many to seek help outside their borders.
It’s no wonder that different agencies have arisen to promote medical tourism and address the concerns of its detractors. The most well known of these is the Joint Commission International which seeks to certify hospitals and other medical facilities around the world. A JCI certificate is often seen as a guarantee that a facility will live up to Western medical standards. Other organizations, like the Medical Tourism Association, offer their own certification while serving as a business networking opportunity for those institutions that want to grow the industry.
Yet if medical tourism is increasingly seen as legitimate, “foreign” stem cell therapies are still stigmatized by the established medical profession. The International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) has called for greater transparency and open evaluation of stem cell therapies. They worry about clinics directly marketing to patients and using anecdotal evidence to support their medical claims. Even those medical travel agencies (like GSP) that are venturing into stem cell treatments are quick to advise patients that many treatments are untested, and that not all therapies will work for all people.
I don’t think that’s going to stop anything. As I said in the beginning, you can’t keep a good thing down. That’s true even if you’re uncertain about how good it really is. Stem cells therapies hold such amazing promise that they are going to be used no matter what. Years before the medical community as a whole would be comfortable with their use, stem cells have captured the hopes of patients the world over. In a sense, it doesn’t matter if medical review processes are unnecessarily slow or not. It doesn’t matter if stem cell therapies in different parts of the world are legitimate or not. Patients in need will seek out untested technologies as soon as the promised benefits outweigh the perceived risks. We’ve already passed that point. For better or for worse.
In a few years stem cell research is likely to be complete enough to produce clinically proven and nationally licensed therapies. But a few years can be a lifetime. I’m still doubtful as to whether stem cell clinics anywhere in the world really possess effective and safe treatments. Yet I know that dire situations force many to choose hope over doubt. Good luck to everyone, no matter which side of the coin you land on. And rest assured: one day recognized stem cell treatments will be available. Can’t be stopped.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
In Wayne Dyer's bestseller The Power of Intention: Learning to Co-create Your World Your Way, he outlines seven steps for overcoming your ego, which I've found helpful.
Step 1) “STOP BEING OFFENDED”
We all know people who get offended by just about everything. When we’re around them, we watch what we say, because we know it won't take much to set them off.
So when you’re around people who are easily offended, realize that it’s their ego. Don’t be drawn into the drama by adding your own two cents or by trying to change their mind.
If you’re the one who’s easily offended, work on changing the negative pattern. (And recognizing it is often the hardest part.)
By constantly being on the lookout for shortcomings in other people, you’re not helping to change anything. You’re actually contributing to the problem.
Step 2) “LET GO OF YOUR NEED TO WIN”
This is hard to let go of because winning is a sure way to get an immediate ego boost. But Dyer points out that you can’t win all the time. And how do you feel when you lose?
If losing devastates you, it’s because you're getting your identity mixed up with winning and losing. But the only thing that's been lost is how you think about yourself. In other words, the loss has occurred to the ego, not to who you truly are.
Step 3) “LET GO OF YOUR NEED TO BE RIGHT”
Why is being right so important to you? Because it strengthens your ego.
But what happens when you're right and your son or daughter is wrong? Or your husband or wife is wrong? Are you able to let go of being right then? Or do you have to prove you're right, even if it means proving that someone you love is wrong at all costs?
“I’ve seen people end otherwise beautiful relationships by sticking to their need to be right. I urge you to let go of this ego-driven need to be right by stopping yourself in the middle of an argument and asking yourself, Do I want to be right or be happy?” says Dyer.
Step 4) “LET GO OF YOUR NEED TO BE SUPERIOR”
“True nobility isn’t about being better than someone else. It’s about being better than you used to be,” says Dyer.
By being in competition with yourself, working to improve your way of being in the world, your focus shifts from lecturing and judging others, to improving yourself. (But don’t judge yourself, or it defeats the purpose!)
Dyer points out that “We are all equal in the eyes of God.” So if God sees us as equal, then how can we be superior (or inferior) to another person?
Step 5) “LET GO OF YOUR NEED TO HAVE MORE”
What happens when we always need more? We can’t appreciate what we already have because it’s not enough. In the end, our lives become shallow, unrewarding, and meaningless.
“The mantra of the ego is more. It’s never satisfied. No matter how much you achieve or acquire, your ego will insist that it isn’t enough,” says Dyer.
When we always need more, we can’t part with what we already have, even if we no longer need or use it, because the ego feels less when it has less.
But having more clothes, for example, doesn't make us better people. It doesn’t even make our lives easier. Having a lot of clothes that are too small, too big, outdated, or stained simply gets in the way. But the ego feels deflated when it looks in the closet and sees empty spaces.
Step 6) “LET GO OF IDENTIFYING YOURSELF ON THE BASIS OF YOUR ACHIEVEMENTS”
Dyer urges us to let go of identifying with our achievements because alone, we don’t achieve anything. “God writes all the music, God sings all the songs, God builds all the buildings, God is the source of all your achievements,” he stresses.
Step 7) “LET GO OF YOUR REPUTATION”
This was probably the hardest thing for me to let go of. I always wanted people to like me and would be crushed if someone didn’t. I'd think, What did I do wrong? At the time, I didn’t realize that I couldn't control what others thought about me, no matter how badly I wanted to.
According to Dyer, what people think about you is beyond your control, so your shouldn't waste time obsessing about it. “Your reputation is not located in you," he says. "It resides in the minds of others. Therefore, you have no control over it at all. If you speak to 30 people, you will have 30 reputations.”
You can't twist yourself into a pretzel trying to please everyone you meet because no matter how hard you try, there will always be somebody who doesn't like you.
Dyer recommends that you do this:
“Stay on purpose, detach from outcome, and take responsibility for what does reside in you: your character. Leave your reputation for others to debate; it has nothing to do with you.”
Since getting back from Duke, one little miracle for our family was that Jack started spontaneously singing for the first time. My wife and I are musical so it's been kind of sad that Jack hasn't had the ability to sing simple songs. For instance, during his kindergarten music recital he seemed to know all of the music but it didn't quite get translated.
So it was really cool to hear him singing himself to sleep for the first time. (and waking me up with a song the next morning)
...and it was also kind of strange. Paradoxically, you can sometimes not miss a thing until it appears.
Anyway, if our Guitar Hero Band continues to improve this month, we may have to go into the studio and record. It's good to know there is an immediate application for his new talent. I guess his little brain is repairing and rewiring itself and we'll be discovering more of him in the coming weeks.
For some of the best new treatment options and a global perspective on stem cell treatment, I recommend you follow Don Margolis who is Chairman of The Repair Stem Cell Institute.
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