Someone posted the link to this article on another PCa NG (I didn't
need to register to access it), I've reproduced the article below.
Anyone know if the rhabdosphincter muscle is the one destroyed during
invasive PCa treatments?..Ron

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=425920

By JOHN FAUBER
jfauber@journalsentinel.com
Posted: May 21, 2006

The Therapy
ADVANTAGES
It is being considered a cure rather than an ongoing therapy.   It uses
cells from the patient's own body, eliminating possible rejection.

POTENTIAL IMPACT
Prevalence of urinary incontinence may be 50% greater than previously
thought, affecting up to 17% of men older than 60 and 38% of women.

"People are walking around (with incontinence) and not even asking
their doctors about it," said Jennifer Anger, a urologist with the UCLA
Medical Center. "Prevalence is high in men and very high in women."

The finding, which was presented Sunday, is the latest accomplishment
in a promising area of research: using adult stem cells derived from
patients' own muscle tissue to treat a troubling condition that affects
more than 15 million Americans.

The researchers described the treatment as a cure, meaning that the
patients did not need to wear pads after they were treated.

"It's highly effective, and it's much more effective than we previously
thought," said lead author Hannes Strasser. "If somebody had told me it
would have worked so well four years ago, I would not have believed
it."

Some of the first patients to undergo the technique remained continent
four years after the treatment, said Strasser, an associate professor
of urology at the Medical University of Innsbruck in Austria.

The results presented Sunday involved 186 men and women ages 36 to 85.
The study involved about twice as many women as men.

One year after the treatment, 153 of all of those treated did not need
to wear pads, Strasser said.

In addition to curing incontinence, the patients also had a
dramatically improved quality of life, he said.

There were no side effects, though a later patient, one of 270 who now
have undergone the therapy, suffered a perforation of the urethra
during the treatment.

Study shows promising results
The research was presented at the American Urological Association's
annual meeting in Atlanta.

"It's a great idea," said Elliott Silbar, a urologist with Aurora St.
Luke's Medical Center who attended the presentation. "They are trying
to replace healthy cells into an area with unhealthy tissue.
Theoretically, it makes a lot of sense."

What's still needed, Silbar said, are studies involving head-to-head
comparisons between the adult stem cell treatment and other types of
injectable urinary incontinence treatments.

One potential advantage to the stem cell treatment is the possibility
that it may need to be done only once, compared with the need for
re-treatment with other injectable therapies, he said.

Strasser said the stem cell treatment costs about $16,000.

The treatment involves harvesting muscle cells taken from a biopsy of
the patient's upper arm. Those cells are grown in a laboratory for
seven weeks, and a small amount of collagen is mixed in.

"What's nice is they are using the patient's own cells," said Silbar,
who was not involved in the study. "You are not going to have any
problem with rejection or diseases. It's totally biocompatible."

What is not known is whether the new cells become functioning muscle,
as is theorized, or whether the injections are just providing bulk, as
is the case with other treatments, Silbar said.

The extracted cells become both myoblasts, or the precursor to muscle
cells, and fibroblasts, a type of connective tissue cell.

The fibroblasts were injected into the urethra, the canal that carries
urine out of the bladder. The myoblasts were injected into the
rhabdosphincter, a ring of muscle around the urethra that acts as a
valve.

The treatment did not involve embryonic stem cells, which generally are
derived from 5-day-old embryos.

More testing needed
The research has created a buzz at the meeting, said Michael Guralnick,
an assistant professor of urology at the Medical College of Wisconsin.

"It almost sounds too good to be true," said Guralnick, who also
attended the presentation.

One advantage of the treatment is that a patient's own muscle cells can
become a potential permanent rebuilding source of the sphincter muscle,
Guralnick said.

He said the cure rate cited by researchers of more 80% is about twice
that of other injectable treatments.

Guralnick said the treatment still needs to be subjected to more
rigorous scientific testing, and it's likely to be a few years before
it is available in the United States.

"This could really be a better alternative, but it's still in its
infancy," he said.

The injections were done using a technique known as transurethral
ultrasound. "We can inject both types of cells very precisely,"
Strasser said.

Imaging showed that the thickness of the urethra and rhabdosphincter
were increased and the contracting ability of the rhabdosphincter was
improved, he said. "It's much stronger," Strasser said.

Other research presented Sunday indicated that the prevalence of
urinary incontinence may be 50% greater than previously thought,
affecting up to 17% of men older than 60 and 38% of women.

"People are walking around (with incontinence) and not even asking
their doctors about it," said Jennifer Anger, a urologist with the UCLA
Medical Center in Los Angeles. "Prevalence is high in men and very high
in women."

Urinary incontinence can be caused by a variety of conditions,
including childbirth, prostate surgery, diabetes, stroke, multiple
sclerosis and Parkinson's disease.

Many in the study had the most common type of urine leakage, called
stress incontinence. It occurs when urine is lost as the result of
pressure on the lower abdomen from activities such as sneezing,
coughing and exercise.