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In 2009, Bolli was ready to launch the SCIPIO trial (Cardiac Stem Cells in Patients with Cardiomyopathy).
CNN: It's amazing what the human heart can do
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Bolli is hoping to start a larger trial by the fall of 2013.
CNN: It's amazing what the human heart can do
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Seven of the 23 acted as a control group, and received no intervention from Dr Bolli after the surgery.
ECONOMIST: Stem cells and medicine: Repairing broken hearts | The
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Like most physicians, Bolli was taught that heart cells don't regenerate, and that any cells which die from loss of oxygen during a heart attack are lost forever.
CNN: It's amazing what the human heart can do
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"That theory always struck me as odd, " Bolli says now.
CNN: It's amazing what the human heart can do
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About four months after each patient's original operation, when their hearts had stabilised, Dr Bolli used a catheter to deliver 1m of the newly bred stem cells to their damaged heart muscle.
ECONOMIST: Stem cells and medicine: Repairing broken hearts | The
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Bolli has refined his procedure to make it less invasive -- stem cells can now be taken through a catheter -- and none of the patients in cardiac stem cell trials have suffered serious adverse effects.
CNN: It's amazing what the human heart can do
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But for those for whom prevention has not succeeded, the work of Dr Bolli and his collaborators and rivals brings hope that a heart attack will, in the future, not be quite the fearful prospect it is today.
ECONOMIST: Stem cells and medicine: Repairing broken hearts | The
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The participants in Dr Bolli's study were 23 unfortunates who had each had at least one heart attack in the past, and were thus lined up for coronary-bypass surgery, in which the furred-up blood supply to the heart is replaced with an alternative artery crafted from a blood vessel taken from elsewhere usually the leg.
ECONOMIST: Stem cells and medicine: Repairing broken hearts | The