Re: nulliparity and risk
From: Cheri Van Hoover (cherivh@xdcr.com)
Mon Mar 13 16:40:41 2006
igold@cox.net wrote:
> On the other hand, there are risks to nulliparity such as increased rates of breast and ovarian cancer................
I'm very fond of this relatively recent research.
Cheri
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Cheri Van Hoover, CNM, MS
Faculty, Midwifery Institute at Philadelphia University
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> Floating Hospital Researchers Find that Fetal Stem Cells May Benefit Maternal Health
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> A study by researchers at the Floating Hospital for Children published in this month’s Journal of the American Medical Association suggests that fetal cells in adult women who have been pregnant may benefit mothers’ health and could possibly advance research without the controversy surrounding embryonic stem cells.
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> The article, entitled "Transfer of Fetal Cells With Multilineage Potential to Maternal Tissue," indicates for the first time that fetal cells similar to stem cells have been found in women who have had a prior pregnancy. This finding suggests that mothers may acquire cells that may have some of the advantages of stem cells.
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> "To date, the controversy surrounding the developmental potential of adult stem cells has been virtually ignored in the role of pregnancy," said Diana Bianchi, MD, Principal Investigator and Chief of Genetics at Floating Hospital for Children at Tufts-NEMC. "In this study we describe a new population of cells for which we coined the term ‘pregnancy-associated progenitor cells,’ or PAPCs. If PAPCs are shown to be true stem cells, they possess the developmental advantages of being fetal in origin, but can be retrieved without the ethical controversy associated with obtaining fetal material."
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> The study found fetal cells that express non-blood markers in mothers’ tissue. These cells may have important long-term health benefits for women who have undergone pregnancy by providing them with a younger population of cells that may have different capabilities in response to tissue injury, the researchers said.
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> Bianchi and her colleagues studied both benign and malignant tissue from 10 women who had at least one son. Using specific DNA probes to identify the presence of the male Y-chromosome, the researchers examined tissue specimens to determine the morphology, cell surface, and intracellular phenotype of fetal cells within maternal organs. In the diseased tissue, the researchers found the fetal cells expressed markers associated with the mother’s tissue. In the healthy tissue, blood markers were expressed. This finding suggests that fetal cells have the capacity to change in the maternal environment, which is a characteristic of stem cells.
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> "With the results of this study, the adult versus fetal stem cell debate is no longer a black or white issue," said Bianchi. "Our finding of fetal stem cells in adult women who have been pregnant could advance stem cell research by providing a means of accessing fetal cells with stem-cell like qualities by drawing blood from a woman."
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> Other Medical Center researchers involved in the study include: Kiarash Khosrotehrani, MD, and Kirby L. Johnson, PhD, of Tufts-NEMC’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology; Robert N. Salomon, MD, of Tufts-NEMC’s Department of Pathology; and Dong Hyun Cha, MD, a visiting fellow in Tufts-NEMC’s Division of Genetics.
