"While treatments exist for the movement disorders caused by Parkinson’s, none of them actually halt progression. Replacing the brain cells destroyed in Parkinson’s holds the promise of actually reversing the disease."
"The IPS cells appear to act virtually identically to embryonic stem cells, but don’t raise the ethical objections many have to using embryonic stem cells... These act-alike cells are not derived from embryos, but are genetically reprogrammed from adult cells, usually skin cells... Moreover, the cells can be made from the patients themselves, which is not expected to cause an immune reaction... So for the great majority of patients, transplantation of their own neurons is a promising approach to relieving symptoms, without having to take expensive and risky immunosuppressive drugs.."
*"Such a therapy has the potential to reverse the symptoms of Parkinson’s in patients by restoring their dopamine-producing neurons."
Source: sandiegouniontribune.com/bu...