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fqfqMember
wow, Laurie49, you had j-pouch and breast cancer???!! and you still have such an amazing attitude!!!! I really respect that, how admirable. Thanks for all your encouragement on this site!

I think stem cells to make even a few feet of extra small intestine before the j-pouch (like Epic Scotsman has) might make for a better functioning j-pouch with longer transit time. The tissue engineering could also help in cuffitis, short bowel syndrome, pouchitis, etc.

Not gonna get into politics, but with elections coming up, funding and priorities for investments may or may not shift.

It will be interesting several years from now when UC patients have new surgical options and say: 'oh wow, you have a j-pouch? Is that the Original Kind or the Double Dipper Deluxe J-Pouch with Extra Fries and a Shake?" Big Grin

I saw a cool 60 Minutes special on Stem Cell Fraud where some doctor from the U.S. moved to Ecuador or somewhere and harvested and sold thousands of dollars of stem cells, promising cures for cerebral palsy and stuff. Duke Medical School said we are far from curing many of these diseases, but there is certainly hope in the future. Worth a watch if you can!
fq
CTBarristerCTBarristerMember
quote:
I saw a cool 60 Minutes special on Stem Cell Fraud where some doctor from the U.S. moved to Ecuador or somewhere and harvested and sold thousands of dollars of stem cells, promising cures for cerebral palsy and stuff.


I believe I saw that show as well. I think he also promised a cure for ALS, a/k/a Lou Gehrig's Disease, which is usually fatal and not only that, it causes a horrible death as the victim slowly loses motor function and the ability to breathe, eat and swallow, while retaining full cognitive abilities and brain function. Basically this guy was a rip off artist/scammer making promises he could not deliver to very desperately ill people who have no other avenue of treatment.

Although this guy was exposed as a major scammer, I did not think the 60 Minutes reporter behaved in a totally professional manner, although that is probably irrelevant to this discussion.

It should be noted that these scammers are operating mostly in countries outside the USA although many of them are educated in the USA as was this scammer.
CTBarrister
Laurie49Laurie49Member
Dog Day -- I'd love to take this to a more personal space, but because you are a coward and have done so many psychotically, insane things on this site, you won't allow anyone to PM you. Remember all the crazed, rantings in the guestbook that forced Bill/Dave to shut it down? Remember chasing all the young women away and stalking others? You know I could go on and on, but would much rather have a discussion in private. Be a man, for once in your life, and let me private message you.
Laurie49
Last edited by Laurie49
Laurie49Laurie49Member
Thanks fq. I am so very grateful for amazing doctors, family and friends. Again -- a great deal has to do with attitude. If you are determined to do whatever it takes to be the best you can be (and for some, that means losing their pouches after giving their all), in the end you will be happy because you will settle for nothing less.

Hang in there. You have a great attitude!
Laurie49
DD Dog Day (Guest)
quote:
Dog Day -- I'd love to take this to a more personal space, but because you are a coward and have done so many psychotically, insane things on this site, you won't allow anyone to PM you.
All for the sake of your attacks, forget it. Just accept the fact that everybody has different outcomes and opinions, and quit berating me already.
DD
Laurie49Laurie49Member
Dog, as I stated -- you are a coward. I wanted to privately remind you of the email you sent to me. The one where you ranted and raved for an entire page that I was a Hitler lover and had probably slept with only Nazi's and that you wished death on me. You also blabbered on and on about prohibition and how I was head of the gangsters and that I was the cause of all the 'manslaughter' that had taken place because alcohol was now legal. Then you went on to explain how everyone on this site, especially Bill, Dave and Kathy were nothing but liars and they would be responsible for the end of all creation if not stopped. It was a psychotic, incoherent, email written by a very, very, sick man.

I will continue to warn everyone about you. You are dangerous and we all know that at any given moment -- you will lose your sh*t (figuratively and literally -- ha ha!) and start in with your all too familiar shenanigan's. This "I come in peace" M.O. is not even remotely convincing. Please add 'horrific actor' to your extensive list of inadequacies.

Remember DOG -- all eyes are on you.
Laurie49
DD Dog Day (Guest)
quote:
It was a psychotic, incoherent, email written by a very, very, sick man.

I will continue to warn everyone about you. You are dangerous and we all know that at any given moment -- you will lose your sh*t (figuratively and literally -- ha ha!) and start in with your all too familiar shenanigan's. This "I come in peace" M.O. is not even remotely convincing. Please add 'horrific actor' to your extensive list of inadequacies.

Remember DOG -- all eyes are on you.
Sick? Take a look at the trash you just wrote here or here
quote:

Laurie49
Posted August 28, 2012 02:15 PM Hide Post
Dgo Day please explain why you are here -- again? You have stated, ad nauseum, all over the internet how this place is 'worse than hell' and that the veterans here are 'worse than the devil himself', and that all we do is "lie". You're right, this is America and a great deal of us feel beyond blessed to have had access to this surgery because it saved our lives! You are certainly not the only person who doesn't like their j-pouch, however -- you are the ONLY one who has been banned over and over again from every site on the internet because you are hell bent on attacking, giving false information, and complaining about NOTHING over and over. Read your posts on here. You might as well just cut and paste. They all say basically the exact same thing. Moaning, groaning, whining about absolutely nothing. There is no substance to what you say.

Share with the newbies here how you have encouraged teens on this site to die rather than have this surgery -- how you have stalked and followed many of them to the point of them going to the administrators and threatening to go to the authorities. Explain how mentally ill you are and how you refuse to have a private conversation with anyone of us because all you care about is getting attention. Share how many gazillion names you've used here and on every other j-pouch discussion board. Share that this is a sick, sick game for you and that you have nothing better to do with your life. Again, there are many who have not been happy with their j-pouches BUT THEY DO SOMETHING OTHER THAN BITCH, MOAN AND MAKE OTHERS LIVES MISERABLE! You've had yours for TWENTY FOUR YEARS -- sounds to all of us who have been forced to 'hear' you for the past 11 years like you're extremely happy being so unhappy.

Just go away, before we have to witness another mental breakdown and you threatening us "Hitler loving Nazi's".
And tell me you don't need some serious psychiatric help.
DD
Epic ScotsmanEpic ScotsmanMember
Alright you two, this thread is a discussion of tissue engineering and other such topics. That's what I started the thread for, not for this.

Does anyone have anything interesting to say about the original topic? Perhaps I'll try to get things going again. Here... we... go.

So I thought I should mention something and that something is the different between adult stem cells and embryonic stem cells. Embryonic stem cells are the ones that cause all that nifty controversy but could, in theory, be coaxed into becoming any sort of tissue type. Of course the controversy arises from the fact that these cells are derived from embryos, but I'll leave all the politics out of this as this is a thread about the science behind these ideas.

Adult stem cells, on the other hand, are plentiful in each and every one of us. Each type of tissue in our bodies has its very own adult stem cells that differentiate into all the different cell types found in that tissue. So small intestinal stem cells diverge into all the various cell types found in the small intestine, etc. There in lies the trouble with adult stem cells as far as many of us are concerned. You can harvest a sample of adult stem cells from the organ that needs to be regrown and then seed those cells onto a new scaffold to grow the new organ with the patient's own cells. With us, that wouldn't really be feasible, as we're sort of missing our colonic stem cells supplies (and it would be far safer not to use those cells anyway, to avoid possible relapses of disease). So the trick to growing a new "colon" is finding a different source of adult stem cells in the patient that can be used to cobble together a functional large intestine (without actually making it from large intestinal tissue).

Now everyone play nice and talk about science...

SCIENCE!
Epic Scotsman
Last edited by Epic Scotsman
Laurie49Laurie49Member
Epic, I sincerely apologize for taking over your thread. I would love to take my conversation with DD to a private place, but he won't allow it. There is no way the veterans on this site are going to allow him to get away with his nonsense. He is a dangerous, sick, troll.

Again, I apologize for interrupting your thread and will try not to do it again however, DD will be the judge of that.
Laurie49
O OnwisconsinMember
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48...d=1&__utmk=118732169

New article on MSNBC relating to this topic. It's an interesting one. Already they have manufactured animal penises, and human ears and bladders. scientists are working on Kidneys, muscles, and fingers. It seem to me a colon and other more vital organs aren't that far off.

The major problem will be convincing insurance companies to cover a procedure to grow and implant an organ, when that organ can be considered non-life threatening to live without. I just doubt it will be cheap enough for insurance companies to be willing to cover it for our situation for many many years after techniques are perfected.

I can see this being available when I'm 50 or 60 and I'm 26 now. It seems so close yet so far away. Yet even at that point insurance won't cover it. I have no faith in that part of our health care institution.
O
P PkittyMember
Hey all - this is a great thread! Thanks to all for input. My question is the following - if I go through and have the jpouch surgery my colon will be removed as well as my rectum. If, in the future, they can do stem cells, could they still put in a colon and rectum for me at that point via a stem cell approach? Or would it be too late since I removed my existing organ and would have the jpouch configuration?
P
Epic ScotsmanEpic ScotsmanMember
Well, I have some theories on this very question. The stem cells in question come from the patient receiving the new organ, so in your case they would come from you. As you're missing your colon/rectum, you would not have any colonic stem cells to harvest for the creation of a new organ. However, all is not lost!

Research is being done with regards to using different adult stem cell lines to engineer a replacement for the colon. I believe there's a link to a very informative paper higher up in the thread that talks all about using different methods to build a new "colon".

Here's my idea: As the j pouch matures, the cellular structure within the pouch starts to more closely resemble colonic tissue than small intestinal tissue. Adult stem cells could, in theory, be harvested from the j pouch and seeded onto a colon-scaffold to grow a new "colon" out of mature j pouch tissue. Using this method, you would basically receive a colon sized, colon shaped j pouch.

Some other considerations would probably have to be taken into account, such as how to simulate the haustral contractions of the colon. The new organ may need to be constructed from several different tissue types in order to function properly.
Epic Scotsman
fqfqMember
my 2 cents:

quote:
Don't they leave a small amount of colon for the re-attachment that could be used?


i would think that they might NOT want to use our colonic tissue from the rectal cuff to create a colon, because it has underlying inflammation and may lead to colitis again?

on that note, i am not sure how creating new intestine for crohn's patients out of their own intestine would work. i think the goal of stem cell research here would be to cure the underlying disease, above creating more organs that could fail in a person whose underlying problems are AUTOIMMUNE and not really organ or intestine.... but there are so many variations in IBD patients

quote:
Adult stem cells could, in theory, be harvested from the j pouch and seeded onto a colon-scaffold to grow a new "colon" out of mature j pouch tissue. Using this method, you would basically receive a colon sized, colon shaped j pouch.


but.... i think that a colonic-shaped j-pouch may not be as efficient at emptying or good as a j-shaped pouch? i think there is a reason they shape it into a "J" because this has shown to work the best... not sure if i'm making sense....

See, although the small intestine and cells of a Mature J-Pouch may show "colonic characteristics", i do not think it is EVER truly and exactly like colon cells. that is what my doctor said. so, if it is not exactly like a colon, it probably won't function exactly like a colon, so the shape of a colon may not work? but i think more important than the shape is the function, although the 2 are probably related. i think even if we could find ways to improve the major problems of a j-pouch via stem cell... like stem cell to fix fistulas, that would be huge!
fq
Epic ScotsmanEpic ScotsmanMember
Good point about not wanting to use a patient's colon tissue fq. As for the shape thing, the pouch isn't really shaped like a j after everything is said and done. The method for creating the pouch folds the end of the ileum into a j shape, but then the tissue separating the two sections of ileum that were folded together is removed to create a single, larger space. After everything is built, the pouch should be more or less shaped like a small rectum.

You are right about the cells in the pouch never truly being colon cells, but from what I've read they get pretty close. At the end of the day, of course, I'm just theorizing about what steps could be taken to get a good functional outcome. Any method for creating a new colon will probably be a bit more complicated than "put x cells on scaffold" and any method would need to be thoroughly tested before use in human patients.

I don't really want to get into animal testing or anything here, but that's where some of the specifics will start getting nailed down. I think the most important thing to remember is that this isn't some far flung bit of wishful thinking. Real people in real labs are actively researching how to put us (and many others) back together in the best way possible.
Epic Scotsman
fqfqMember
SCIENCE ROCKS!!!

do you think a lot more advancement is being made in Europe than in the U.S.?

http://www.news.leiden.edu/new...-crohns-disease.html

soon, we will be half-human, half-machine!

http://news.discovery.com/tech...g-tissue-120828.html


I mean, they are making a jellyfish from a rat, so anything is possible, right?

http://news.discovery.com/tech...at-cells-120723.html

and making a brain?

http://www.nature.com/news/tis...e-brainmaker-1.11232


ok, now I am getting scared and have the heebie-jeebies Big Grin but wow, i am speechless and fascinated!!! Science is so amazing! too bad I was such a klutz in the chemistry lab! i will admire it from afar!
fq
Epic ScotsmanEpic ScotsmanMember
Here's a link to an interview that should give a goodly number of answers:

http://www.popularmechanics.co...ew-organs-in-the-lab

If you're asking how long it takes to grow an organ in the lab, apparently it's about 8 weeks. If you're asking me how long I think it will be until we're all walking around with shiny new science colons, I'd say anywhere between 5 and 20 years. 5 because the technology is already there and some other organs have already been grown and implanted (like bladders and windpipes). 20 because these things take time to perfect and you certainly wouldn't want to go to all the trouble if you weren't confident in the results.
Epic Scotsman
R RWNCMember
All very interesting. I have to agree with Jan it is probably more than 20 years off. Growing tissue in the lab is a technology that has been around for years. The problem comes when you try to integrate that tissue in the body as you need to integrate the blood supply and nervous system which requires a significant amount of time. So I would imagine that even if you had a successful transplant there would be MANY more adaptation issues with your body learning to use the new colon than there would be with the J-Pouch while your nerves and blood supply grow. Also as a side note, I think there would be a greater risk of cancer in these cells from my experience working in the biologics industry. When you grow cells of any kind outside the body, they eventually become immortalized and cancerous. So even if this technology was available, I wouldn't want it nor if my children ever get UC would I allow them to have it until there was significant amounts of long term data available.

Also even if they could somehow grow and transplant a colon successfully, I don't think patients with UC would be the primary candidates for this type of surgery. There are too many unknowns regarding what is the trigger for UC so there are no guarantees it will not come back and come back in a more severe form. And even if you get it tranplanted I would find it hard to believe that an IRB or research institution would sanction this type of risky surgy when you have reasonable alternatives available (ileostomy and J-Pouch). I think it is more likely those individuals with Chrons or cancer who have lost a good deal of the small bowel would be more likely candidates for stem cell therapies and bowel transplants. I think finding the trigger or triggers and blocking those is still the best bet for curing UC.
R
N new2thisstuffMember
Vanessavy,

If growing intestinal organs does become a reality in the future then one would think scientists could just as easily use tissue from the small intestine to shape an organ that would replicate a colon rather than using diseased colonic tissue. This would prevent disease relapse and likely be a better solution for FAP or colitis patients. But also, I would keep in mind that the causes of both diseases are not fully understood. Most of us were not born with an intestinal disease so it's more than likely something triggered the disease process ie. possibly an underlying virus. So if they are able to grow a new colon in the future somehow by using our stem cells instead of diseased tissue perhaps the disease would not return.
N
Jan DollarJan DollarModerator, RN, retired
But, this is what can really blow your mind...

Say they can engineer a colon. Say they can integrate it successfully to operate on all levels in the body. But, in my mind, what the real challenge would be altering your genetic makeup that predisposed you to IBD or FAP in the first place. That would be like going back in time and changing your ancestors! If you did that, would you still be you? Probably, but what is to say that if you delete one bad acting gene, some other one takes it place, and it is even worse than the one you replaced?

OK, that is sounding like a bad science fiction story now...

Jan Smiler
Jan Dollar
CTBarristerCTBarristerMember
quote:
OK, that is sounding like a bad science fiction story now...


All of which again reminds me of that horrible movie "The Human Centipede", discussed in another thread on horror films. The apparent point of that movie was to expose the dangers of trying to "play God."

Eventually we, as a society, will have the technology to do some of these things. They may enable us to actually determine the root causes of IBD, through trial and error if in fact these kinds of procedures can be done. For example, a colon transplant and then observe to see how the disease replicates as compared to how it manifested in the original diseased colon. Or, if there is no similar manifestation, assuming environmental triggers of the original manifestation are isolated and eliminated.

I recently saw a movie which depicted the historical treatment of lepers in leper colonies and it made me wonder how IBD was treated in history before Crohn's was determined in 1932 and UC was detected in 1875. More on this here:

http://web.uct.ac.za/depts/git/ibd/history.htm

It seems like we have come a long way in a short period of time so it is not unreasonable to believe these types of tissue engineering procedures will be done in the near future. I have had IBD since 1972, that is now 40 years, and in my lifetime I have seen extraordinary advances in how IBD is treated. And those advances have been able to keep me going for all this time.
CTBarrister
LG Lou Gibson (Guest)
quote:
But also, I would keep in mind that the causes of both diseases are not fully understood. Most of us were not born with an intestinal disease so it's more than likely something triggered the disease process

I've thought the same thing many times too. I've never had my problems with serious illnesses. And then one day, I was involved in a bad accident. I was in a coma for week after that. Nobody knew if I was going to live. When I awoke from the coma I felt fine. Even though the surgery I went through made J Pouch surgery seem like child's play. And then only 2 or 3 months later my first signs of UC appeared.
LG
Laurie49Laurie49Member
I believe some of us are born genetically predisposed to certain diseases. What happens in our lives in terms of diet, environment, physical activity, stress...etc., all contribute to what happens. Some with a predisposition will never suffer with it and others will. If autoimmune disease wasn't in our genetic make-up, we never would have had UC/Crohn's/Cancer/FAP regardless of car crashes, other illness's, parasites, etc.
Laurie49
CTBarristerCTBarristerMember
quote:
Say they can engineer a colon. Say they can integrate it successfully to operate on all levels in the body. But, in my mind, what the real challenge would be altering your genetic makeup that predisposed you to IBD or FAP in the first place. That would be like going back in time and changing your ancestors! If you did that, would you still be you? Probably, but what is to say that if you delete one bad acting gene, some other one takes it place, and it is even worse than the one you replaced?

OK, that is sounding like a bad science fiction story now...


I am reading a book right now called "Next" by Michael Crichton. It's the last full book he wrote before he passed away in 2008. It's about the very issues discussed in this thread. Tissue engineering and transgenic experiments, including a transgenic chimpanzee (which are called humanzees) and a transgenic grey parrot. Like most of Crichton's books it is an interesting weave of science fact and fiction. Indeed, in true Crichton fashion the forward message to the book is: "This novel is fiction, except for the parts that aren't." You could say that about most of his books.

It's an essential read for anyone interested in the subject matter of this thread. Crichton also discusses medical applications of tissue engineering, including with cancer patients and patients with other diseases, and the legal, moral and ethical implications that are involved.
CTBarrister
Last edited by CTBarrister
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