Potential Type-1 Diabetes Treatment from Medical Waste
NextCell Pharma, a Swedish biopharmaceutical company, is developing a type -1 diabetes drug from mesenchymal cells collected from umbilical cords using a selection algorithm. These umbilical cords are donated by infants’ parents and results of this development are producing encouraging results in the Phase I-II trial.
This treatment and development of ProTrans were presented in Sweden at the Nordic Life Science Day. Leo Groenewegen, co-founder of NextCell and business development manager, spoke to reporters after the presentation saying, “After the cells are extracted and checked for bacterial infection, we test them against several criteria, using our selection algorithm.”
After the pure stem cells are selected using the algorithm, they are cultured and put together without further modification, at this point the treatment is ready to be administered to the patient.
NextCell ran two parallel trials with ProTrans for treatment of type-1 diabetes. The first trial was designed to assess the safety and efficacy of the drug. The second trial is ProTrans-Repeat to evaluate if repeated treatment can increase or maintain the effect of the drug over a longer time period while continuing to maintain safety.
According to NextCell’s executives, there are several potential benefits to this development method. This process enables production of larger quantities of the treatment which could potentially lead to a more affordable treatment to a larger patient population. This in comparison to more individualized and costly treatments available. Another benefit is the potential flexibility. With adjustments to the algorithm and selection criteria, it could possibly be used for different treatments including autoimmune, degenerative diseases, inflammatory and even transplant rejections.
People are usually eager to donate umbilical cords, which would otherwise be medical waste. According to Groenewegen, “It is always the peoples’ choice, but without donations we cannot advance our science. As long as cells become available, treatments will become available and medical research will go forward.”
The importance of donations could open up the field above what is currently available. Groenewegen stated that with this science, researchers can “go from managing a disease to actually being able to cure it.”
According to NextCell Pharma, the final patients have been treated in the ProTrans-1 trial. Patients are subject to a 12-month follow up period prior to releasing data on the efficiency and safety of the treatment which is expected in Q3 of 2020.
