Therapy Yields Promise for Fatal Neurological Condition
Posted on Wednesday, May 14 @ 07:31:42 CEST by Raulken |
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TUESDAY, May 13 (HealthDay News) -- A new gene therapy that involves injecting a harmless virus into the brain shows promise as a safe and effective way to slow Batten disease, a rare neurological disorder that usually becomes fatal between the ages of...
 Gene therapy shows promise in brain disease Washington, May 14: An experimental gene therapy treatment appears to have helped eight children with a rare and incurable neurological disorder, although it may have been responsible for the death of one, researchers reported on Tuesday.
They said the treatment appeared safe and effective enough to try in more children with late infantile neuronal ceroidlipofuscinosis, or LINCL, a form of deadly Batten disease.
The treatment, in which a virus carrying the corrective gene was infused directly into the brain, appeared to slow the decline of eight out of 10 children treated, Dr. Ron Crystal of New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Centre and colleagues reported.
"We are encouraged by this. It`s not a cure," Crystal said in a telephone interview.
Like all forms of gene therapy, the hope is that the mutant cells will take up the new gene and start working normally.
Children with LINCL start showing symptoms at about age 4. They lose coordination, vision and speech and usually die unable to breathe on their own, between 10 and 12.
One child suffered an epileptic seizure weeks after treatment and died and another child died of unknown causes two years after treatment.
Eight of the children showed a measurable slowing of the inevitable decline...
Click here to read the content (Source Zee News)
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