Placenta Stem Cells Are the Most Promising Healer of Our Time -- But Beware of the Chorion, Warns StemCell Pharma.

LAS VEGAS -- In the search for stem cells, many sources have been used including umbilical cord, embryos, bone marrow, fat, and blood, but mainly from placenta, the most generous of all.

Methods of extracting stem cells are numerous, including one that is keeping placenta in a nutritional medium for a few days in order to maximize their harvest. Subsequently these stem cells are distributed to researchers and used in the treatment of many diseases.

Published results show substantial, and sometimes impressive, results using these cells -- but also the appearance of cancers.

This brings to focus a matter that is practically unknown to most researchers and clinicians: namely, that placenta is not one organ or one entity but is composed of three main players, each one performing separate functions that are at times competing or plainly antagonistic. They are the maternal placenta, amnion (the amniotic sac) and the chorion (chorionic sac or fetal placenta). The maternal placenta and the amnion are credited with impressively good results, one of them the amnion, producing stem cells that a team from the University of Pittsburgh stated are "strikingly similar to the embryo's cells," considered the best of all. The third player, the chorion, that plays, among others, two important roles: 1) It forms a strong immune suppressive shield around the embryo in order to prevent the mother's immune system to reject it as a foreign body; and 2) It is also producing hormones for the future child, and according to German scientists, should not be used in patients with overactive adrenal gland mainly elevated level of cortisol, the immune suppressive hormone (that can induce cancer in experimental animals). They state clearly that "chorion has an immune suppressive effect." They also made a very interesting statement, namely, "It is unfortunate that the different effects of the two placenta portion are little known." It is indeed. As such and theoretically speaking, when stem cells are extracted from placenta, they should contain by necessity stem cells from the chorion. If these cells can play a role by inducing cancer, it is not known at the present time, however this possibility, even minor, should be a reason of concern for those using the "whole" placenta in stem cells research and clinical studies. So if the "whole" placenta stem cells play a role in cancers, than by logic, by removing the chorion, which is a very simple technique, then the placenta minus the chorion would become, in our opinion, one of the best hopes of our time in diseases such as MS, ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), lupus erythematosus (LE), Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, cancers, and especially diseases of the eye such as macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa (RP).

In this respect, StemCell Pharma is in our view the sole owner of a technique that maximizes the beneficial effects of placenta and minimizes the risks.

While we know the enormous potential of our stem cell/placenta implant, we still have to abide by the rules of the FDA. That means that we might not ever be able to use it here in the States.

In the meantime, we are putting the final touch to a line of placenta containing oral products that we believe would be the best approach to controlling aging.

We will keep you posted.