壞疽(Gangrene)或稱糖尿病左小腿皮膚壞死(Diabetic's foot)是老年人得到糖尿病容易衍生的病理症狀，難以治療往往要走向截肢的命運。南韓的生技公司-RNL Bio日前為一名72歲典型糖尿病病患進行自體幹細胞移植試驗，病患於十天後恢復腿部70-80%潰爛組織，並慢慢有了知覺，免除截肢的命運。
壞疽主要因糖尿病病患血糖過高造成末稍神經血管的病變，神經受損始病患肢體變得遲鈍，並在血液循環不足的情況下，肢體組織養分失調而導致脆弱病變。症狀不只是疼痛，還會產生高血壓、顫抖、忽冷忽熱，並容易引發細菌感染而得到敗血症。
糖尿病引起的壞疽需進行截肢比例佔車禍和創傷等全部截肢手術比例的一半。壞疽病人接受截肢手術後，還需要給於氧氣和抗生素治療。日前南韓的生技公司-RNL Bio於國際細胞治療協會(ICMS；International Cellular Medicine Society)的年會上針對再生與細胞醫學領域發表最新的治療方法對於糖尿病的壞疽病症。
針對一名72歲的糖尿病病患，先抽取自身的幹細胞，體外增生後打入3億顆幹細胞於兩腿。幹細胞移植後的十天，腿部的膿與傷口恢復70-80%；二十天後，恢復到90%，腿部也開始產生知覺，這項重大發現提供臨床醫師對於糖尿病病患的壞疽病症一個無需截肢的治療方法。
Diabetic amputation prevented with new stem cell technique
It's not a pleasant subject, especially for older women and their families. One of the hidden threats of diabetes is that it is the most common chronic disease to decay or kill living tissue through gangrene. Gangrene from diabetes mellitus accounts for about half of all amputations not caused by trauma or accident in the United States. Secondary amputations within several years after the first are very common.
Gangrene usually appears after a person loses the blood supply to his or her foot. It is especially insidious because the nerve loss destroys the sufferer's protective ability to perceive sensory input--not only pain, but also pressure, vibration, heat, or cold. Gangrene thus sneaks up on people. It can quickly become life-threatening, especially when flesh-eating bacteria develop.
In the past, gangrene has resisted medical treatment. It has to be surgically removed, often by amputation, and followed by oxygen treatment and intravenous antibiotics. During the recent ICMS (International Cellular Medicine Society) Annual Congress on Regenerative and Cell Based Medicine, the world's first successful treatment of severe gangrene without amputation was presented. The procedure was pioneered by RNL Bio, a Korean company. It involves use of the patients' own banked stem cells to restore life and function to the gangrenous limb.
The patient, a 72-year old man from South Korea, had the classic podiatric complications of diabetes, including change of color, necrotic tissue, and deep wounds. Apparently, he was about to undergo an amputation of the affected extremity when he was referred to a South Korean company, RNL Bio, that took stem cells from the patient himself and infused about 300 million of them into each foot.
Stem cell therapy healed gangrenous ulcers with complications and improved foot sensory perception in a person with long-term disease who had previously had no alternative to increasing gangrene other than amputation. Ten days after stem cell injection, pus and wounds had improved by 70-80% improvement; 20 days later, by 90%. This recent reversal of gangrene by Korean physicians is a radical measure. It means amputation may have just taken its first step toward obsolescence as a life-saving treatment for gangrene.
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