Repetitive Intramyocardial CD34+ Cell Therapy in Dilated Cardiomyopathy (REMEDIUM)

Summary

The goal of REMEDIUM project is to develop personalized stem cell therapy for patients with chronic heart failure due to dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). The main focus of the project is (1) on repetitive administration of cell therapy that would allow for long-lasting improvements in heart function and outcome in this patient population. In parallel, the investigators aim to (2) develop a standardized patient-specific stem cell product that could be cryopreserved and stored in a stem cell bank for prolonged time periods, and used for therapeutic application when clinically indicated. By using a unique multimodality imaging platform, the goal of this project is also to (3) define standardized clinical criteria that would serve as a guideline for evaluation of the effects of stem cell therapy in future clinical trials and everyday clinical settings. Finally, to improve the clinical implementation of cell therapy,the investigators aim to (4) develop a stem cell delivery technique that could be used to treat both left and right and ventricular failure and could be implemented in a standardized fashion designed for a widespread clinical use.

Timeline

Start

2014-01

Primary completion

2017-09

Completion

2017-12

Publications

• Background Vrtovec B, Poglajen G, Lezaic L, Sever M, Socan A, Domanovic D, Cernelc P, Torre-Amione G, Haddad F, Wu JC. Comparison of transendocardial and intracoronary CD34+ cell transplantation in patients with nonischemic dilated cardiomyopathy. Circulation. 2013 Sep 10;128(11 Suppl 1):S42-9. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.112.000230.
• Vrtovec B, Poglajen G, Sever M, Zemljic G, Frljak S, Cerar A, Cukjati M, Jaklic M, Cernelc P, Haddad F, Wu JC. Effects of Repetitive Transendocardial CD34+ Cell Transplantation in Patients With Nonischemic Dilated Cardiomyopathy. Circ Res. 2018 Jul 20;123(3):389-396. doi: 10.1161/CIRCRESAHA.117.312170. Epub 2018 Jun 7.
• Frljak S, Jaklic M, Zemljic G, Cerar A, Poglajen G, Vrtovec B. CD34+ Cell Transplantation Improves Right Ventricular Function in Patients with Nonischemic Dilated Cardiomyopathy. Stem Cells Transl Med. 2018 Feb;7(2):168-172. doi: 10.1002/sctm.17-0197.
• Rozman JZ, Perme MP, Jez M, Malicev E, Krasna M, Novakovic S, Vrtovec B, Rozman P. The effect of CD34+ cell telomere length and hTERT expression on the outcome of autologous CD34+ cell transplantation in patients with chronic heart failure. Mech Ageing Dev. 2017 Sep;166:42-47. doi: 10.1016/j.mad.2017.06.001. Epub 2017 Jun 19.

Drugs

Indications