Even for a stem cell research wonk like me the broader regenerative arena never ceases to surprise me with the latest thing being stem cell shampoo.
Stem cell shampoo
A news item that seems promotional discussed the stem cell shampoo as yielding positive results.
So after you are done with your vampire facelift, stem cell facial, stem cell IV infusion, stem cell joint injections, etc. you can now slap some supposed stem cells on your hair too? I’m skeptical. The shampoo reportedly contains argan stem cells. This is one of dozens of products claiming to do stuff for people based on plant stem cells including many types of shampoos.
Think Gwyneth Paltrow. There’s also Augustinus Bader.
Nordstrom has had many such products.
More recommended reads
- The FDA has warned Neobiosis over its allogeneic perinatal stem cell products. It’s a pretty standard warning letter in noting the products seem to be unapproved drugs and listing CGMP violations. This feels like just more whack-a-mole by the agency. It needs to break the mold and do something more significant. With hundreds of clinics selling these unapproved cellular drugs, the demand is so strong that there will always be more and new suppliers of this stuff. In this case with Neobiosis, they have been marketing a variety of perinatal cell products including Wharton’s jelly. The letter went to Neobiosis leader Ian A. White, Ph.D. For more background, see this explainer post: What is an FDA warning letter & how should firms respond?
- Speaking of the FDA, the NYT just called on the agency to do more on unproven stem cell clinics. When Will the F.D.A. Crack Down on Stem Cell Clinics? from NYT Editorial Board member Jeneen Interlandi.
- Engineered Virus Steals Proteins From H.I.V., Pointing to New Therapy, NYT. This is exciting but raises complex ethical issues including the fact that the new TIPs as they are called may be contagious and could cause permanent genetic changes.
- Sustained amphiregulin expression in intermediate alveolar stem cells drives progressive fibrosis, Cell Stem Cell. Stem cells in the lungs and respiratory system more generally remain a relatively unexplored frontier. The endogenous ones along with progenitors do many things but it’s still not clear that administered stem cells or other cell therapy products like PRP have any usefulness for lung diseases.
- Regulation of the hematopoietic stem cell pool by C-Kit–associated trogocytosis, Science. Trogocytosis? Cells exchanging plasma membrane segments.
Well, too much to dive into here, but 1) most of the products we’re talking about are acellular. I notice most people just automatically assume “stem cells” (see above article), but these perinatal products don’t contain stem cells (MSCs are not stem cells) and the vast majority don’t contain any cells at all. 2) Just look at the Pew report published a few years ago. It showed that over a 16 year period only 360 adverse events (about 22 per year) using all forms of regenerative medicine (inc perinatal tissues) were reported. These events were not a result of anything wrong with the product, but rather how they were stored/contaminated by the end user. Compare that with the 1700 people who die every week and over 3 million hospitalized each year with adverse events from prescribed drugs in the US. We can’t claim placebo when there is so much peer-reviewed in vitro efficacy and potency data, so much pre-clinical data and so much phase I and phase II clinical trial data, not to mention the vast numbers of published case studies. The data is throughout the scientific and medical literature.
Maybe it’s time to ask the question “why” are these products under such high demand? Because they are demonstrably safe and incredibly effective. It took 17 years before penicillin was accepted by the medical community. Then Flemming won a Nobel Prize. Now it’s hard to imagine a world without it.
@Ian,
What is your hard clinical trial evidence that they are “extremely effective”? Perinatal product safety depends a lot on lab procedures and CGMP-type deviations would increase risks, putting safety at risk.
I think the demand comes from people being desperate for more options and the regular portrayal of the products as some kind of panacea.
The other issue with allogeneic perinatal materials is the cells’ likely quick deaths and/or rejection by the body, especially if administered IV. So at most I see a very transient improvement as possible, which could just be an expensive placebo effect.