The man sitting across from me said he was desperate. Osteoarthritis was causing excruciating pain in his knee. But he had found a solution: For $18,000, a doctor in Mexico would inject stem cells from a Russian embryo. What did I think?
"I don't know what to tell you," I said. "First, there has never been a controlled clinical study looking at embryonic stem cells that tells me it works for knee osteoarthritis. Second, I don't know anything about the safety."
Those concerns didn't stop this patient, and I am waiting to hear the results. But I'm not optimistic that these results will be any better than those of the man I met on an airplane flying to the Dominican Republic. When I caught up with him later, he had nothing to show for the $45,000 he spent on stem cells for his severed spinal cord.
That's the environment now in which orthopedic sports medicine specialists must operate. Right now, everyone loves the phrase "stem cells." It means hope for people who haven't found any relief for an ailment, whether it is arthritis, spinal cord injury, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Crohn's diseaseUnfortunately, unscrupulous physicians are taking advantage of the hype and cashing in on these patients' desperation.
