The search for a curative cell therapy in Parkinson's disease

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder, characterised by the progressive loss of dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra, and typically treated by dopamine replacement. This treatment, although very effective in the early stages of the disease, is not curative and has side-effects. As such there has been a search for a more definitive treatment for this condition, which has mainly concentrated on replacing the lost neurons with neural grafts. Possible cell sources for replacement range from autologous grafts of dopamine secreting cells to allografts of fetal ventral mesencephalon and neural precursor cells derived from fetal tissue or embryonic stem cells. Some of these cells have been the subject of clinical trials, which to date have produced disparate outcomes. Therefore, whilst cell therapies remain a promising treatment for PD, there is need for further refinement of the techniques involved in this experimental procedure, before any new trials in patients are undertaken.