Stem Cells and Cancer

Cancer has been one of the most feared diseases these days. Many patients died after the suffering treatment, yet only few survived and lived under medication control. Too many cancer cases arise lately, such as lung cancer, heart cancer, blood cancer, you name it! And we have become very familiar with this disease. But actually what is cancer? Cancer or malignant neoplasm is a group of cells which have abnormal rapid growth, damage body tissues, and have the potential to spread to the whole body.
Therapeutic cloning

Stem cells for cancer treatment

Since the previous cancer treatments didn't show any satisfying results, scientists are now using stem cells for cancer treatment. Stem cells are cells in their early stage of development, and they have the potential to be specialized become other cells (heart cells, lung cells, etc.). The stem cells treatment is meant to replace the cancerous cells with healthy cells to heal the patients. Stems cells therapy for cancer includes these three steps :

1. The bone marrow blood stem cells are taken from the patient and frozen
2. Chemotherapy is given to the patient
3. The stem cells are transplanted back to the patient

It is important to transplant stem cells for cancer patients after chemotherapy and radiation, because both chemotherapy and radiation also kill the bone marrow blood cells (good and healthy cells) beside the cancer cells. Since the cancer cells are damaging body tissues, the best weapon to reverse the situation is through stem cells therapy. First, the stem cells are brilliant cells which can tract the problem area and focus to fix it. Second, stem cells can be specialized into any kinds of cell to replace any kinds of damaged / cancerous cells. Beside it can replace the damaged cells, it also triggers the organs to produce more healthy cells.
benefits of stem cell research

The study of cancerous cells includes cancer cell biology and tumors.
1. The study of cancer cell biology found that there are also cancer stem cells which have the ability to renew themselves (produce more cancerous cells).
2. It is important to differ the tumors (the abnormal mass of a certain tissue) from cancers so that the scientists can obviously examine the actual growth of cancer cells.

Both the above studies are crucial to find out :
1. Genes that support the cancer stem cells' renewal
2. How cancerous cells are produced
3. Genetic abnormalities
4. The stem cells' growth and specialization
5. Best drugs to treat cancers

Stem cells treatment for cancer patients has been used for more than a decade and proved to be very successful. Unlike other treatment methods, stem cells treatment for cancer has saved many lives, the patients are actually cured. However, further studies are necessary to be done for understanding the cancer cells reproduction and best drugs to cure it.