Facial deformities require precision and delicacy to reconstruct. The pigs, all 14 of them, are doing fine. Considering they’d been retrofitted with bone grown in a laboratory, that came as a pleasant surprise. “The pigs woke up, and a half-hour later they were eating,” said Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, a professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University. “We thought they would be in pain. But no, they’re doing great.” Dr. Vunjak-Novakovic and her colleagues have managed to create living bone from stem cells. First, they made a CT scan to create a 3-D image of each pig’s jaw. From cow bone, they sculpted a “scaffold” — a three-dimensional copy of the pig bone.

Click here to read the full article

More than 150 scientists, clinicians and trainees will join a panel of 32 internationally renowned speakers in a collegial and conducive atmosphere to catalyze the biology of stem cell research and translational advances towards therapeutics. The conference will be co-chaired by Dr. Jeremy Mao of Columbia University and Dr. Michel Goldberg of University Paris Descartes. 

The outcome of this conference will be published in a high impact stem cell or regenerative medicine journal and serve as working and evolving guidelines for the dynamic field of the biology and translation of DOC stem/progenitor cells.

Click here to read the full article

A month ago, my 6-year-old wiggled her first tooth out, and the tooth fairy dutifully left a glitter-strewn $1 bill and a nice note. In response to my Facebook post announcing this major milestone, my mom pointed out an article about “banking” baby teeth because — get this — the living dental pulp inside baby teeth contains stem cells.

Click here to real the full article

For the full story, click here.

The technique, the first of its kind, represents a significant advance in the development of personalized treatments for patients suffering from a variety of lung issues. The team believes that the method, utilizing a patient’s own stem cells, could pave the way for generating lung grafts that avoid the risk of rejection during transplantation. The ability to regenerate lung cells also enables researchers to better study and understand lung diseases thereby accelerating the development of more effective treatments.

For the full story, click here.

Engineering bone tissue substitutes from human induced pluripotent stem cells

Abstract:

The team has grown more than 50 healthy bones from stem cells. The team is experimenting with a variety of scaffolding materials, including bone stripped of all cellular material as well as silk scaffolds developed by Tufts University. The scaffolding with the stem cells are housed in a bioreactor which nourishes and directs the stem cells to regenerate and differentiate into newbone. As the new bone develops, the scaffolding material dissolves, resulting in new, fully-functioning bone.

For the full story, click here.

Dr. Huang previously served as the Chair and Herbert Schilder Professor in Endodontics and Director, Postgraduate Program in Endodontics of Boston University’s Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine. Dr. Huang’s current research interest is in the area of stem cells and regenerative medicine with particular emphasis on the generation and characterization of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from dental stem cells, creating an indefinite stem cell source for tissue regeneration and an invaluable tool for the study of disease.

We congratulate Dr. Huang on his well-earned advancement and anticipate the many future contributions he will make as an acknowledged leader of his field.

Prof. Dr. Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic is a Mikati Foundation Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Vice-Chair & Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medical Sciences, and Director of Laboratory for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering at Columbia University. She will be presenting on Cell-instructive biomaterials for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.

As one of the most rapidly advancing fields in modern medicine, regenerative medicine and the study of stem cells will be a prominent focus at the Summit. For more information of about The European Life Sciences Summit, click here.

Dr. Mao, DDS, PhD, a leading stem cell researcher and co-head of Columbia University’s Center for Craniofacial Regeneration discussed several recent advances in stem cell dental treatments and the likely impact stem cells will have on the practice of dentistry.

To view a full list of Dr. Jeremy Mao's research presentations at the AADR annual meeting, as well as other similar research, click here.

Beyond the world of dentistry, the regenerative properties of stem cells are being used to treat many forms of trauma, genetic conditions, degeneration, disease and natural aging. As these therapies continue to develop, access to your own mesenchymal stem cells becomes increasingly important.

A valuable population of mesenchymal stem cells can be readily obtained from the dental pulp in teeth. Dental pulp stem cell acquisition can be accomplished by preserving a shed baby tooth in a timely manner or coordinating with your dentist to obtain the stem cells from a wisdom tooth upon extraction. Once the stem cells from dental pulp of teeth have been properly preserved, they would be available to the patient to use in a potentially broad range of regenerative treatments to address a wide variety of disease, trauma and injury such as Parkinson’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, spinal cord injury, burns, heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis.

Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic is the Mikati Foundation Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Medical Sciences and is the Director of the Laboratory for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering at Columbia University. She was recently inducted into the National Academy of Engineering, and is also a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering. Professor Vunjak-Novakovic received her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Belgrade.

Presenting with Professor Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic is Dr. Yiannis Monovoukas; chairman, president, and chief executive officer of TEI Biosciences Inc., a privately held regenerative medicine company that develops novel biologic products for a broad spectrum of soft tissue repair, reinforcement, and reconstruction applications. Dr. Monovoukas holds an MS and PhD in chemical engineering from Stanford University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

To learn more about this Wednesday’s lecture and stem cell research at Columbia University, click here.

The American Dental Association sponsors National Children’s Dental Health Month every February to raise awareness about the importance of oral health. The 2012 NCDHM campaign brings together thousands of dedicated dental professionals, health care providers and others to promote the benefits of good oral health to children and adults, caregivers, teachers, and many others.

Good oral health is obviously important for your overall health, but did you know that there are stem cells in your child’s baby and wisdom teeth that are just as valuable to their future health? With the knowledge from recent medical research, StemSave gives you the opportunity to save these cells for future use in developing medical treatments for your family.

To view the NCDHM Program Planning Guide and download fun activity sheets for kids, click here.

Reprinted from The Los Angeles Daily News by Stephanie Cary

People often dread going to the dentist, many of them putting it off for as long as possible, but getting to the dentist early in life could benefit you in the long run, and for reasons that have little to do with your teeth.

Research is underway to determine the possibility of using dental stem cells as treatment for various cancers and injuries, much like the use of stem cells from umbilical cord blood, amniotic fluid and bone marrow.

There are currently no Food and Drug Administration-approved treatments using dental stem cells, but that hasn't stopped some dentists from offering their patients the opportunity to harvest them through companies such as StemSave and Store-A-Tooth.

"When I heard how easy it is to harvest the stem cells from teeth and the potential uses for them, it seemed like something that was a great service we could provide for our patients for a number of reasons," said Dr. Jay Reznick, who uses StemSave at his Tarzana practice, Southern California Center for Oral and Facial Surgery.

Those reasons include the accessibility of the dental tissue in which the stem cells are found.

The harvesting process is done when patients come in to have a healthy tooth - a tooth with blood supply - removed, whether it be a wisdom tooth, a baby tooth or a tooth being taken out for orthodontic purposes, Reznick says.

He says it's best to harvest dental stem cells in a child under 18 because as the cells age the stem cells become less viable.
The process does not increase soreness or require extra healing time for the patient, Reznick says.

Once the tooth is removed, instead of throwing it away, the doctor or dentist puts the tooth in a vial and ships it to StemSave overnight. If stem cells can be harvested from the tooth, they are preserved through a process called cryopreservation.

The mesenchymal stem cells found in dental tissue are thought to be best used to rebuild bone, cartilage, nerve tissue or muscle tissue, Reznick says. Researchers also have used these stem cells to become insulin-producing cells inside the pancreas so some day they may be able to treat diabetes, Reznick says.

"Even though there's not a clinical use that's FDA approved at the moment, there's a lot of research that's being done. In fact, in the lab they are growing jawbones in mice from dental stem cells," Reznick said.

"They are also generating muscle tissue and nerve tissue, so there's a lot of research going on at a very rapid pace," he said. "More and more researchers are getting involved in this across the world, to be able to use these very accessible stem cells in order to be able to treat diseases and conditions in patients."

Dr. David Dann offers StemSave though his Tarzana practice, even though he says dental stem cell research is in its infancy.

He says he believes in the current research so much he had his son's dental stem cells harvested with StemSave.

"I remember when my kids were born, people were starting to save the stem cells from umbilical cords and it was a little bit unknown to us at that time, so I feel like I missed that opportunity in not doing that," Dann said.

"And I feel that saving the stem cells from the teeth is simple. I think it's a simple procedure. It's easily accomplished."

The extended opportunity to harvest dental stem cells is another reason Reznick decided to get on board.

Like Dann, when his children were born Reznick was told about storing stem cells from the umbilical cord. At the time, there were no clinical treatments that the stem cells could be used for and the process was expensive. So, Reznick passed on the one-time opportunity.

Since then, numerous clinical uses have been developed for stem cells from umbilical cord blood including treating lymphoma, leukemia and other cancers, Reznick says.

"Umbilical cord blood and amniotic fluid are also great sources of stem cells. However, you really only have one opportunity to harvest those cells - basically when the child is born," Reznick said.

"If you miss that opportunity then it's gone, whereas with dental stem cells you have multiple opportunities throughout the child's life to be able to harvest and preserve the stem cells later on."

The cost of storing dental stem cells is also cheaper.

There is a $600 initial fee and a $100 annual fee to join the StemSave bank. In contrast, to bank umbilical cord blood with StemCyte, the initial fee is more than $2,000 and there is a $125 annual fee.

Despite the possible uses of dental stem cells, neither Reznick nor Dann have many patients taking advantage of the opportunity. But they both expect that to change as more information is made available.

"It's just a matter of time - these clinical treatments involving stem cells from the teeth are proven and approved," Reznick said.

"In the future, I expect to see not only an increase in the number of uses that are found from these cells, but I think you will also see some clinical applications that are going to become clinically approved and fairly common."

For more information about harvesting dental stem cells, go to www.stemsave.com.

The complete article can be found here:

 WPEC - CBS12.com

WEST PALM BEACH -- Could your teeth hold the key to a life-threatening illness years down the road? Local families are getting a new outlook on what to do with their children's baby teeth or painful wisdom teeth.

For years, pregnant women have been given the option of storing cord blood for stem cells in case of future disease or injury. Now, there's a much more readily-accessible source of stem cells, and it's in your child's mouth.

Rebecca Fogel recently underwent surgery to remove two impacted teeth. But instead of discarding them, local oral surgeon Dr. Andrew Slavin suggested they be saved for what's inside, stem cells.

"Impacted wisdom teeth are a great source of these stem cells," said Dr. Slavin.

It was recently discovered that the dental pulp inside wisdom teeth and baby teeth contains a rich source of stem cells. Stem cells are different than other cells in the body because they regenerate and produce specialized cell types. They heal and restore skin, bones, muscles and nerves. That has opened the door to new medical treatments being developed to treat a range of diseases and injuries thought to be difficult or impossible to treat.

So how does it work? The surgeon extracts the tooth, puts it in a special solution to preserve it and sends it to a company called StemSave. StemSave retrieves the stem cells and stores them until you need them.

"If a teenager had his wisdom teeth out and later in life in their third decade or fourth decade of life, they developed a chronic disease, a muscle condition a problem with their liver or their heart, they could actually use their stem cells their own stem cells and not have the fear of rejection from using someone else's tissue," said Dr. Slavin.

StemSave's initial fee is $590, then $100 a year for storage.

"It was a no brainer for me. It was an insurance policy for her in the future. So we're really glad we went ahead and did it," said Rebecca's mother Cathleen Fogel.

Cathleen isn't worried about Rebecca getting sick in the future. She's hoping for a future treatment for Rebecca's cerebral palsy, and Rebecca is banking on those teeth to provide a cure.

"Hopefully one day we can repair some of the damage that Rebecca suffers from her cerebral palsy and that she'll be able to walk and do things easier," said Cathleen.

"Can we get rid of it?" asked Rebecca.

"Hopefully, God willing, we'll see. We don't know what the future holds as technology advances," said Cathleen.

http://www.cbs12.com/articles/teeth-4732394-cells-liz.html#ixzz1M9vwIvq9

Dentists are pulling teeth, then having the stem cells stored in case they're needed to fight disease.

By Fred Tasker, photos by Marice Cohn Band.

Naidelys Montoya didn't wait for her son's baby teeth to fall out. She took the boy to an oral surgeon to have two of the loose ones extracted.

``He was a bit scared,'' said Montoya, of Hialeah. ``He's not that brave.''

The dentist shipped the teeth in a temperature-controlled steel container to a lab in Massachusetts, where their stem cells will be spun out, frozen to more than 100 degrees below zero and stored -- in case her son, Raul Estrada, 6, might need them for a future illness.

``I believe in this,'' Montoya said. ``I did as a precaution against things that could happen in the future.''

Montoya and her son have joined a major new medical movement.

In South Florida and around the world, dentists are extracting baby teeth, wisdom teeth and even healthy adult teeth, and researchers are spinning out stem cells that they believe can be used to regrow lost teeth, someday even to repair damaged bones, hearts, pancreases, muscles and brains.

It could put the Tooth Fairy out of business.

``These are teeth we've been discarding as dental waste,'' said Dr. Jeffrey Blum, the Miami Beach oral surgeon who pulled Raul's teeth. ``We might as well get some use out of them.''

``I can't help but feel excitement for their potential use in regenerating different tissues in the human body,'' said Dr. Jeremy Mao, director of the Regenerative Medicine Laboratory at Columbia University. Mao also is chief science advisor to StemSave, a New York City company that freezes the stem cells and stores them for later use.

There are concerns. It's expensive, costing $590 upfront plus $100 a year to store the stem cells from up to four teeth for up to 20 years. It's speculative, with the first FDA-approved practical use of such stem cells years away.

``Every treatment using dental stem cells is still in the clinical testing phase, and won't be ready for general use for at least five years,'' said Art Greco, StemSave's CEO.

Montoya understands: ``Things are evolving so quickly, who knows what they will be able to do in 15 or 20 years?'' Other researchers welcome the new source of stem cells.

``Perhaps it does make sense to save'' dental stem cells, said Dr. Joshua Hare, director of the Interdisciplinary Stem Cell Institute at the University of Miami Medical School, who is not involved with dental stem cells. ``Within human adults and children there are lots of reservoirs of stem cells. We get them from bone marrow; others use umbilical cord blood. It seems teeth are also a good source.''

The National Institutes of Health concluded in 2003 that teeth are a rich source of stem cells. Every child has about 20 baby teeth that fall out between ages 6 and 12. Adolescents have wisdom teeth that often are removed between ages 14 and 25 because they crowd the jaw or grow in crookedly.

Blum and other oral surgeons must extract baby teeth before they fall out naturally, so they still have a blood supply to keep them healthy. He puts them in a temperature-controlled steel container and overnights them to the StemSave facility.

Stem cells are the body's repair system, Hare said. Stem cells beneath the skin are constantly spinning off new skin cells to replace skin that is sloughed off or damaged in daily life. The same is true for hearts, livers, pancreases -- except that as the body weakens from age, injury or disease, those stem cells start to lose the ability to keep up and need help. Today, stem cells from bone marrow, blood and now perhaps teeth can be reprogrammed to help those ailing organs.

Also, by using these stem cells researchers avoid involving human embryonic stem cells, which are controversial because their creation involves destroying human embryos.

The first practical use of dental stem cells probably will be to repair human teeth and jawbones, researchers say. At Boston University's School of Dental Medicine, researchers have used stem cells from baby and wisdom teeth to generate dental pulp, the soft interior of a tooth, and dentin, its hard white casing.

Now they are inserting the material into a broken human tooth and implanting it into a mouse to access a blood supply. When the technology reaches humans, the pulp material would be injected into a spongy ``scaffold'' where a tooth has been removed and prompted to grow into a human tooth. It's at least five years away.

Across the world, the use of stem cells to heal the human body is exploding. At UM Med School, Hare is doing human trials using stem cells from bone marrow to inject around hearts damaged by heart attacks, hoping to regenerate damaged heart tissue.

For years, stem cells from umbilical cord blood have saved the lives of patients with leukemia, lymphoma, multiple myeloma, aplastic anemia, sickle cell and other diseases.

Umbilical cord blood is being donated both to private labs for use only by the donor's family, and also to public donation centers that are opening across South Florida.

In Broward County, Memorial Health Care System, Memorial Hospital West in Pembroke Pines, Memorial Regional in Hollywood and Memorial Hospital in Miramar have opened or are opening public cord-blood donation centers.

Women giving birth may donate their umbilical cords without charge. The blood is flown to a lab at Duke University in North Carolina, where the stem cells are spun off and stored at subfreezing temperatures. The cells become part of a National Cord Blood bank where they are available to any patient in the world if an adequate cell match can be determined.

South Miami Hospital opened a similar center in 2009.

Cord blood stem cells collected for private use have been more speculative because of the rarity of diseases it can treat. A 2009 study published in the peer-reviewed journal Obstetrics and Gynecology said cord blood stem cells in private banks have been used in less than half of one percent of cases over the past 10 years. But stem cells in public cord blood cell banks are in short supply, especially for Hispanics and African Americans.

So far, only private banks are storing dental stem cells, although Mao says a public bank would be valuable and appropriate.

The American Dental Association, while cautiously optimistic about the potential of dental stem cells, urges parents considering banking their children's dental stem cells to consider both the cost and the rarity of use before joining private donation programs.

``That's the question people have to ask themselves,'' Blum said. ``Am I saving this for no reason? Is it worth what I'm paying? Essentially it's an insurance policy.''

Another important question, of course, is what Blum tells kids when he ships away their baby teeth before they can collect from the Tooth Fairy.

He shrugs: ``I leave that up to the parents.''

Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/01/17/v-fullstory/2020617/pulled-teeth-stored-for-stem-cells.html#ixzz1BOzgPnQi

“But the best stem cells for use in stem cell therapy are your own,” said Gregory Chotkowski, StemSave’s President. “By doing so, the risks of non-biocompatibility and tissue rejection are negated.”

StemSave and other companies like it are putting dentistry in the forefront of helping to save and preserve life. Those at StemSave believe stem cell banking will become the standard of care in the next two to five years.

Read the entire article

StemSave is featured in the cover story of this month's Access Magazine, the Official Publication of the American Dental Hygienists' Association. Jean Majeski's comprehensive overview of the Stem Cell landscape in the Dental industry, the Hygienist's role in the process, and also features Gregory Chotkowski, DMD, President and co-founder of StemSave. Download the complete article here:

StemSave will be exhibiting at The American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (AAOMS) 91st Annual Meeting October 12th – 17th, 2009  in Toronto, Canada. We invite you to stop by Booth #2235 and allow us the opportunity to introduce you to the StemSave™ dental stem cell recovery and cryopreservation service. Built for Dental Professionals, by Dental Professionals, The StemSave Advantage can enhance your practice and expand the level of care that you already offer to your practice’s highly-valued patients.

StemSave(TM), Inc, a market leader in the field of stem cell recovery and cryo-preservation, announces today that S Christopher Theodoros has joined its senior management team. Theodoros, recently Director of Industry Relations for Google, Inc., will be responsible for leading StemSave’s growth and leadership in the biotech field as well as spearheading innovative digital marketing efforts.

“Chris joins at a crucial time for StemSave as we’re seeing renewed interest and investment from the Obama administration and heightened interest and investment from the private sector in the field of stem cell research,” said Art Greco, CEO of StemSave. “Stem cell research, technology and medicine are advancing at an exponential pace and StemSave gives people the ability to tap into those innovations by providing an affordable and non-invasive method for the recovery and cryo-preservation of the powerful adult stem cells found in teeth by teaming up with dentists to recover stem cells during routine dental procedures.

Chris brings a level of expertise and insight from growing early stage companies that will help lead StemSave’s ramp up during these exciting times where StemSave makes it possible for anyone with access to a dentist to have the ability to procure their own stem cells for use in future regenerative medical therapies.”

Read entire article

In research centers, universities, and hospitals around the world, there are remarkable scientific advancements giving families the ability to recover valuable stem cells for use in future regenerative medical applications With the recent discovery of powerful stem cells within deciduous teeth and third molars, both children and adults now have the opportunity to recover and cryo-preserve their stem cells both noninvasively and affordably, giving dentists the opportunity to be on the frontlines of medicine’s most exciting developing field.

Dentists can now play a larger role in their patient’s overall health by assisting them in the recovery and cryo-preservation of the patient’s own very powerful stem cells. Introducing StemSave into a dental practice gives dental practitioners an opportunity to delve deeper into their patients’ health concerns and to offer a valuable service that transcends oral health. Indeed, it speaks to the future health of the entire being.

Stem cells are unique in that they are the only cells in our body that can regenerate. They are the repair and maintenance cells of the body and are the key to unlocking the promise of regenerative medicine. The foundation of this type of medicine is based on the body’s own natural reparative abilities; the stem cells’ abilities to replace damaged tissue caused by aging, disease, and injury. Another unique feature of certain types of stem cells is their ability to differentiate, meaning that in addition to their ability to regenerate, they can turn into a broad range of specialized cells. This enables stem cells to regenerate organs, tissues, bones, and much more. We are witnessing stem cell therapies being developed to treat disease and trauma such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, MS, arthritis, heart disease, spinal cord injuries, joint replacement, genetic diseases, and many more.

Read entire article in the WDJ

Scientists are now developing a number of strategies in the laboratory for producing dopamine-releasing neurons from human adult stem cells to be transplanted into humans with Parkinson's disease. If the generation of an unlimited supply of dopamine-producing neurons is successful, neurotransplantation may be widely available for Parkinson's patients in the future.

Parkinson's disease is just one of many previously incurable diseases and conditions that may find a cure in stem cell regenerative therapies. Muscular dystrophy, Alzheimer's disease, osteoporosis, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, renal failure, and spinal cord injuries are a few others. Virtually any disease that occurs as a result of damaged, failing or malfunctioning tissues may potentially be cured through regenerative therapies.

Stem cells from one part of the body will be expanded (grown out) and reimplanted to replace an entirely different type of tissue. This type of transplant will totally negate the need for antirejection drugs, since the implant is made of the patient's own body cells.

Jeremy Mao, DDS, PhD, a professor and director of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine Laboratory and professor of dentistry at Columbia University, states that, although more clinical research and differentiation studies are needed involving dental stem cells, the future holds a great potential for the use of these cells. Clinical research of the potential for utilizing these cells in the treatment of diseases or conditions involving neural, bone, cartilage, or fat is just beginning.

Dr. Mao's latest announcement states in an abstract that he has turned dental stem cells into pancreatic beta islet cells that produce insulin. Considering the fact that the occurrence of diabetes in the United States is reaching epidemic proportions, this is most exciting!

Read the entire article

Many Individuals are willing to pay the money to preserve their teeth and for the chance of a cure later in life. Dr. John Lupori of Alpine Oral and Facial Surgery in Steamboat Springs first collected teeth for a storage bank several weeks ago and has done it a few times since then.

For Miriam Pensack’s family, it wasn’t a difficult decision.

The 17-year-old from Steamboat Springs has the same heart condition that caused her father to get a heart transplant. She was unconscious at Lupori’s office, about to get her wisdom teeth pulled, when her dad learned about StemSave, a New York company that stores dental stem cells.

“If, God forbid, I needed a heart transplant, . . . we think stem cells would be hugely beneficial,” said Pensack, who learned through genetic testing that she had inherited hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a disease of the heart muscle that can cause sudden death in athletes.

The teenager’s father, physician and psychiatrist Robert Pensack, said he wasn’t thinking just of Miriam’s heart condition when he decided to save her dental stem cells.

“It’s my personal belief that stem cells are going to revolutionize medicine,” he said. “As she ages, as all of us will, she could come down with all kinds of other illnesses.”

Read entire article

We’ve all heard about the promise of stem cells: Chinese doctors are experimenting with treatments for neurological diseases, and Spanish surgeons made headlines last fall after they grew a new section of windpipe for a woman using her own cells. While much of the research and most of the therapies are still figments of scientists’ imaginations, a New York-based company called StemSave is offering to bank your own cells in anticipation of the day when potential is turned into reality.

StemSave harvests stem cells from teeth already pulled by your dentist, which are delivered to its lab in a patented transportation kit that keeps cells alive by chilling them. All stem cells aren’t created equal, but StemSave CEO Art Greco claims that cells from teeth are particularly versatile — and the younger the tooth, the better. The service costs $590 to join, and $100 per year after that.

Read entire article

Miriam Pensack went to Alpine Oral and Facial Surgery to have her wisdom teeth pulled in November, when she awoke she learned that her father had chosen to have her stem cells saved.

When Lupori removed Miriam’s teeth, he checked to make sure the pulp was there and put them into a preserving solution. The office shipped the teeth to New York. StemSave’s laboratory workers tested them for viable stem cells and stored Miriam’s tissue.

Pensack, a former emergency room doctor who now is a psychiatrist, didn’t hesitate when he learned he could have Miriam’s cells saved. He has hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a condition in which the muscle of the heart is abnormal without an apparent cause. It’s genetic.

If stem cell research advances to the state he thinks it will, people could have diseased heart tissue

replaced with healthy tissue grown from their own cells.

One of the benefits of growing a new organ from your own stem cells is that you don’t have any risk of the body rejecting it, Pensack said. Pensack underwent a heart transplant because of his condition. He takes two drugs to keep his immune system from rejecting the organ. He takes 13 drugs to treat the side effects of those two.

“You take them forever, and they’re all like chemotherapy,” Pensack said. “They’re poisonous to other organs.”

Miriam said her family frequently discussed the potential of stem cells. She’s glad hers are on ice because they could help her deal with any medical issue she encounters.

“Hopefully, should complications come up in my health, that is a pretty firm pillar to lean on,” Miriam Pensack said.

Read Article      View Video

In the spring of 2008, I read an article about preserving the stem cells from baby teeth. My first thought was that it was a waste having all of my children’s teeth sent to the tooth fairy instead of to StemSave. During the annual American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry meeting in May, I spoke with the people at the StemSave table. They were doing the same thing with baby teeth as the people 12 years ago were doing with the cord blood.

Once parents choose to save their child’s baby teeth, we explain to the child that we will give them a special tooth box and the tooth fairy will still come to their house. There is so much emotion and nostalgia associated with losing baby teeth. While parents may want to take the traditional under-the-pillow route with the first tooth, we try to create a new sense of excitement with sending the tooth off to StemSave. We encourage the child to draw a picture or write a note to let the tooth fairy know where the tooth is and that we only need the stuff on the inside and she can take the stuff on the outside!

Sources of Dental Stem Cells  In a child, the most accessible stem cells are from the oral cavity. For deciduous teeth, the best candidates are moderately resorbed canine and incisors with the presence of healthy pulp. In children, other sources of easily accessible stem cells are supernumerary teeth, mesodens, over-retained deciduous teeth associated with congenitally missing permanent teeth, and prophylactically removed deciduous molars for orthodontic indication.

Read the entire WDJ article

View ‘The Doctor’s’ Video

Columbia University professor Dr Jeremy Mao to present his research findings on dental stem cells & Discuss the medical, health care and business implications of preserving patients’ dental stem cells

Presented at the Greater New York Dental Meeting (GNYDM), Jacob K Javits Center in New York City,  Wednesday, December 3^rd at11:45am.

More than 55,000 health care professionals will gather at the Greater NY Dental Meeting where Dr. Jeremy Mao, DDS, PhD will discuss the medical applications of dental stem cells and how dentists can incorporate this groundbreaking discovery into their practices. 

Dentists are now in the unique position of being able to help patients preserve their own stem cells.  Instead of discarding a patient’s tooth during a routine medical procedure, a new technology allows dentists to preserve these teeth so patients can bank their stem cells.

Dr. Mao, one of the leading stem cell researchers in the world, will discuss his latest scientific findings and why dentists should expand their practice to incorporate the recovery and cryo-preservation of dental stem cells on behalf of their patients.

CHICAGO, IL – Hu-Friedy’s online dental hygiene community, Friends of Hu-Friedy  is designed exclusively for RDHs, dental hygiene students and faculty, the program, which offers professional support for its members in various ways, now includes complimentary CE courses. The membership program’s CE catalog currently offers multiple courses with the newest addition titled: Stem Cells: Emerging Medical and Dental Therapies and the Dental Professional. As a special introductory offer, Stem Cells: Emerging Medical and Dental Therapies and the Dental Professional will be complimentary to all members (no Hu-Points needed to redeem for credit!) now through October 31st , 2008!

The 2 CEU course was developed in collaboration with Dr. Gregory Chotkowski, DMD, president of StemSave, Inc. The course centers on how the dental professional will play an important role in both the recovery and the future use of stem cells in Dental and Medical regenerative and personalized therapies.  

It was great meeting you at the ADA meeting in San Antonio.  For those of you that visited our booth, and would still like to recieve the complimentary Code  for the 4-Credit CE Course entitled: Stem Cells: Sources, Therapies and the Dental Professional, please contact us at [email protected] or call us at 877.StemSave.com.   We look forward to seeing you again next year.

Read entire article

September 15, 2008 11:30pm

It was great meeting you at the AAP's 94th Annual Meeting September 6-9 at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center in Seattle.  For those of you that visited our booth, we will be emailing you the complimentary Code  for the 4-Credit CE Course entitled: Stem Cells: Sources, Therapies and the Dental Professional. We look forward to you enrolling as a StemSave Dental Professional.

Overview:

Abstract: