The potential of stem cell therapies

A great deal of research effort is now being invested in stem cell transplantation therapies, to restore neurological function.⁵ In related fields, such as spinal cord injury research, important progress has been made using stem cells to treat patients with neurological injuries.⁵

However, serious ethical and methodological issues remain, such as whether or not to use embryonic stem cells; how to prevent Lewy pathology from developing in transplanted cells; how best to deliver the cell-based therapies; and how to prevent a reaction against the transplanted cells by the patient’s immune system.^1,2,4,5 Recently, it has become possible to work with ‘induced pluripotent stem cells’ (iPSCs), which can subsequently become neurons.⁵ Whilst more research is needed to test this method for treating Parkinson’s disease, an initial case-study has shown promising results for the iPSC approach.⁶

References:
1. Zhu B, Caldwell M, Song B. Development of stem cell-based therapies for Parkinson’s disease. Int J Neurosci 2016; 126 (11): 955–962.

2. Barker RA, Drouin-Ouellet J, Parmar M. Cell-based therapies for Parkinson disease – past insights and future potential. Nat Rev Neurol 2015; 11 (9): 492–503.

3. Aman Y. Stem cell therapies for Parkinson’s disease. Nat Aging 2025; 5: 727.

4. Barker RA, Björklund A, Frucht SJ, Svendsen CN. Stem cell-derived dopamine neurons: will they replace DBS as the leading neurosurgical treatment for Parkinson’s disease? J Parkinsons Dis 2021; 11 (3): 909–917.

5. Pen AE, Jensen UB. Current status of treating neurodegenerative disease with induced pluripotent stem cells. Acta Neurol Scand 2017; 135 (1): 57–72.

6. Schweitzer JS, Song B, Herrington TM, et al. Personalized iPSC-derived dopamine progenitor cells for Parkinson’s disease. N Engl J Med 2020; 382 (20): 1926–1932.