Lab grown urinary tubes offer hope for cell-based therapies

The study, published in the journal 'Lancet,' is a first in the field of regenerative medicine showing the potential power of cell-based therapies.

Doctors believe it might help repair injuries and replacement of whole organs.

The five patients for the study, aged 10-14 from Mexico, had suffered injuries in accident.

"When an organ or tissue is irreparably damaged or traumatically destroyed, no amount of drugs or mechanical devices will restore the patient back to normal," said Anthony Atala, M.D., W.H. Boyce, Professor and Director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, and Chair of the Department of Urology at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina.

After six years, urine flow tests and tube diameter measurements confirmed the success of the tissue-engineered urethras, offering a potential cure.

A different challenge
An injury, disease or birth defects can lead to defects in urethra. Short defects are repairable, whereas, larger defects are treated with a tissue graft, mostly taken from the lining of the cheek or skin.

In almost half of the cases these grafts fail causing infection, pain, bleeding, and urination problem.

Atala's team earlier had managed to grow and implant hollow organs as replacement bladders in nine children in 1998. However, the tubular structure of urethra provided a different challenge.

Researchers took small pieces of cells from the bladder of each of the boys and cultivated them to multiply into large quantities. Required cell types, muscle cells and endothelial cells, were grown in sufficient numbers and were implanted in the boys.

After about four weeks, the boys were able to use the new urethras for urination.

Future of the study
Atala's team followed the boys for roughly six years and said,"They continue to do well, which is what was nice to see."

He said larger studies would be needed before the treatment could be widely used.

Professor Chris Mason, an expert on regenerative medicine at University College London, said, "Totally grown in the laboratory, these urethras, living tubes which convey urine from the bladder, highlight the power of cell-based therapies.