Understanding Regenerative Medicine: The future of healthcare
It is our body’s natural capacity to heal, when inflicted with wound. Regenerative medicine harnesses this power of our bodies to replace damaged tissues and allow the growth of new ones. As the name suggests, the promising field facilitates “regeneration” of tissues and organs that are damaged by trauma, disease, or congenital issues. This implies that by using the tools of regenerative medicine. one can treat the underlying cause of a diseased or damaged tissue rather than just treating the symptoms.
Regenerative medicine is not a Pill!
It is a set of approaches which tweaks the wound healing capacity of the body. So that the body starts to grow new cells in place of damaged tissues. Some of these approaches are gene and cellular therapies, the use of non-invasive medical devices, and stem cell therapy. These approaches involve the methods which are either minimally invasive or non-invasive and generally are outpatient procedures.
In cell-based therapies, the cells from our own body which have special function to regrow. also known as stem cells, are harvested either from blood, bone marrow, or amniotic fluid and are injected at the site of damaged tissue. These special cells are also accompanied by many factors which help in kick starting the wound healing process. Consequently, the action of stem cells and accompanied factors leads to healing of the damaged tissue. which is finally replaced with newly formed tissue. For example, for the healing of acne scars, the harvested “regenerative cocktail” from the patient’s own body is injected at the scarred site. This allows the cells surrounding that site in the skin to proliferate and divide which eventually. leads to the formation of newly formed skin tissue at that site thereby healing acne scars.
Current State
Currently, regenerative medicine is used for removal of stretch marks, treatment of urinary incontinence (involuntary leakage of urine.) post menopause or childbirth. causes of infertility in men or women, sports injury, baldness. skin rejuvenation, vaginal rejuvenation or total body rejuvenation. The most intriguing part of regenerative medicine is that there no side effects reported for these therapies. The reason behind this fact is that since the cells are harvested from our body (blood, bone marrow, or amniotic fluid). There is a rare chance that your body will react adversely to it. This allows for the greater implementation of the regenerative medicine approaches for disease treatment.
Owing to the fact that “Regenerative Medicine” procedures offers so many advantages over the use of traditional disease treatment process. Like no side-effects, less recovery time, treatment of the underlying cause of the disease, minimally invasive or non-invasive procedures, this area of medicine is certain to bring a paradigm shift in the future of healthcare. As this sector gains momentum, the research in regenerative medicine is also on the rise. The scientists are applying and testing various procedures to treat the diseases for which no treatment is available yet.