Stem cell therapy can be used to treat Crohn's disease

It is possible to inject the body with its own stem cells to treat Crohn’s disease. This is the discovery made by LUMC PhD candidate Marjolijn Duijvestein: ‘Stem cell therapy is only used when all else has failed. This bowel disease may not be fatal, but it also cannot be cured. Alternative therapy is therefore very important.’

Bone marrow

According to Duijvestein’s research, it is possible to cultivate stem cells from the bone marrow of a Crohn’s disease patient. Furthermore, it proved to be safe and feasible to administer these stem cells intravenously to Crohn’s patients.

‘Rheumatism of the intestine’ Inflammatory bowel diseases, such as Crohn’s disease, have a partially genetic cause. They are a severe inflammatory response of the bowel, where there should normally be no inflammation. A kind of intestinal rheumatism.

Duijvestein: ‘Crohn’s disease is not fatal, but in the worst cases, after many operations, the patients hardly have any intestines left. The disease cannot be cured, which is why it is necessary to consider alternative treatments.’

Marjolijn Duijvestein obtained her PhD on 9 February, Senate Room, Academy Building

Pioneering role

Leiden University is proud of its stem cell research. Duijvestein: ‘’We are leaders in this field, together with Karolinska University in Sweden and the University of Pavia in Italy. In order to do this kind of research, you need a European level certificate, but also a licence from the Dutch Ethics Committee and the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sports (VWS).’

Healthy donor

In this relatively young field of research, Leiden has already had the necessary licence for a number of years. Duijvestein: ‘You are only allowed to cultivate and inject cells if it is considered safe and feasible to do so. This is what we call Phase I and Phase II research. Since we have proved our abilities in this field, we can now go one step further. We now also have permission to carry out research with stem cells from healthy donors.’

Modified stem cells

Yet another step further would mean injecting modified stem cells. Duijvestein has already carried out some experiments on mice. When the mice were injected with activated stem cells, they reacted better to the therapy. These are the first results of stem cell therapy for chronic bowel diseases and the basis for further research. At the moment, these studies are being carried out in an international context. Two PhD students will continue to work on the project under Duijvestein’s supervision.

Focus

Duijvestein has now shifted her focus to a specialisation as a stomach, bowel and liver specialist. Her first ambition after completing her medical studies was to do research: ‘I started doing research primarily because I like it; I have the rest of my life to be a doctor. I first wanted to gain more in-depth knowledge, before I continued on this path. Now I am doing the first two years of the specialist training in Amsterdam. I want to get to know Amsterdam, but afterwards I will return to Leiden.’

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Last Modified: 14-02-2012