The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Costa Rica and the National Academy of Medicine (Acanamed), issued a warning on Thursday before the proliferation of places that offer different types of cell therapies.
Currently, the country has no specialty in cell therapy. However, there are places that offer almost miraculous treatments against various diseases, which worries the specialists.
The Medical Association emphasized that there is no registered or recognized specialty of Cell Therapy, Stem Cell Therapy or Regenerative Medicine. Therefore, it does not recognize or have registered specialists in this therapy and technology.
This position was born from a process of study on the subject. To do this, the College created a Commission of Stem Cells, formed by experienced doctors, specialists in different fields of medicine, who studied the matter thoroughly, as well as the aspects that regulate the practice in Costa Rica and other countries.
The College of Physicians recommends that the public carefully study the information provided before making the decision to undergo these unauthorized therapies. It is important to create awareness to avoid exposure to procedures and interventions without scientific evidence, made by unscrupulous individuals, who adduce specialties and exhibit foreign diplomas by organizations unknown in the country and not recognized and incorporated by this institution,”
said Andrés Castillo, president of the College .
Both institutions stressed that the only technique recognized is that of bone marrow transplantation (hematopoietic stem cells), which are used in the treatment of certain blood diseases, since they have clinical scientific evidence recognized by medical science and by the international regulatory bodies.
Arístides Baltodano, president of Acanamed, said that with the exception of bone marrow transplantation, the use of cells from another source, including those of the patient (autologous) of adipose tissue and other tissues, are in an experimental phase, which means that all the interventions in which these cells are used are experimental and for research purposes regulated by the current Biomedical Research Regulatory Law, which must be reviewed and approved prior to its use and application, by a Scientific Ethics Committee and endorsed by the National Council for Health Research (Conis) and that, being part of an investigation, the researcher cannot charge fees for the application of these therapies.
The concern of both institutions regarding the use of stem cells is also due to the multiple risks associated with the administration of these cells, so the intervention must be done under special conditions of investigation and justification of its application.
On the other hand, establishments that perform and apply cell or regenerative stem cell therapies, as well as those that collect, receive, process, store and conserve cells, must have permission from the Ministry of Health and approved protocols, which guarantee the control of the quality, safety and viability of the cellular product. The collection and manipulation in the case of peripheral blood stem cells can be done by microbiologists incorporated to their professional school- However, they can only manipulate stem cells from other sources, since the collection in this case must be done by a doctor.