Home / News & Publications / Michigan Catholic News / 2007 / Local Professor seeks cures
Local professor seeks cures with adult stem cells
Robert Delaney of The Michigan Catholic
Published September 28, 2007
Robert Delaney | The Michigan Catholic
Jean Peduzzi-Nelson, Ph.D., a professor and researcher at the Wayne State University School of Medicine. | Detroit – Medical researcher Jean Peduzzi-Nelson, Ph.D., already knows the use of adult stem cells can lead to new treatments, because she has seen promising results.
"I believe adult stem cells are the safest and probably most effective for treatment," says Peduzzi-Nelson, a researcher and professor at the Wayne State University School of Medicine.
She is among the experts who appear in the 12-minute DVD being mailed to every Catholic home in Michigan next week by the Michigan Catholic Conference.  watch the video
Cord blood bank
Donations of umbilical cord blood, used for nondestructive stem-cell research, are accepted at five hospitals in the Archdiocese of Detroit. The hospitals, which collect the blood through the Michigan Community Blood Bank Service, are:
• Huron Valley Hospital in Commerce Township
• Oakwood Hospital Medical Center in Dearborn
• Hutzel Hospital in Detroit
• St. John Hospital and Medical Center in Detroit
• Providence Hospital in Southfield | A member of Our Lady of Sorrows Parish in Farmington, she is currently involved in a clinical trial prompted by the work of a Portuguese doctor in taking adult stem cells from the uppermost area of the inside of the nose — tissue known as olfactory mucosa — and injecting them into patients with spinal cord injuries.
Peduzzi-Nelson says patients involved in the trials have exhibited greater sensitivity in treated areas and increased ability of their muscles to contract.
"One of the first seven patients regained bowel control," she says.
Besides the ethical-moral issues involved, Peduzzi-Nelson says the use of a patient's own adult stem cells appears to have several advantages over embryonic stem cells: "You don't have to worry about rejection (by the patient's body), or about disease transmission, or about the overgrowth of cells (tumor formation)."
The good news about what is being done with adult stem cells too often is lost in news reports that focus on the debate over the use of embryonic stem cells, in her view. "People need to educate themselves about stem cells, and what exactly this controversy is about," she says.
For more information, visit http://www.med.wayne.edu/anatomy/.
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