Stem Cell Therapy for the Treatment of Chronic Ischemic Heart Disease

Abstract

Chronic ischemic heart disease remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Several trials have been performed to evaluate benefit of stem cells transplantation to restore cardiac function in short- and long-term period after myocardial infarction. This concise review analyzes 15 clinical trials between 2005 and 2020 comprising 1372 patients (608 treated) and is aimed to: 1): assess percent increase in left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) and decrease in New York Heart Association (NYHA) class at 12 months after stem cells transplantation after acute myocardial infarction and 2) correlate LVEF percent increase with number of transfused stem cells. \n \nNine trials reported a significant percent LVEF increase and NYHA class decrease at 12 months after bone marrow and peripheral blood stem cells transplantation correlating with transplanted cells number. Caution should be exercised in the evaluation of these results due to the different stem cells utilized, transplant protocols and endpoints, and the small number of patients treated in some studies.