Progenitor Cells Derived from Drain Waste Product of Open-Heart Surgery in Children.

Human cardiac progenitor cells isolated from the same host may have advantages over other sources of stem cells. The aim of this study is to establish a new source of human progenitor cells collected from a waste product, pericardiac effusion fluid, after open-heart surgery in children with congenital heart diseases. The fluid was collected every 24 h for 2 days after surgery in 37 children. Mononuclear cells were isolated and expanded in vitro. These pericardial effusion-derived progenitor cells (PEPCs) exhibiting cardiogenic lineage markers, were highly proliferative and enhanced angiogenesis in vitro. Three weeks after stem cell transplantation into the ischemic heart in mice, cardiac ejection fraction was improved significantly without detectable progenitor cells. Gene expression profiles of the repaired hearts revealed activation of several known repair mechanisms including paracrine effects, cell migration, and angiogenesis. These progenitor cells may have the potential for heart regeneration.

Thallium-201 is comparable to technetium-99m-sestamibi for estimating cardiac function in patients with abnormal myocardial perfusion imaging.

We analyzed the left-ventricular functional data obtained by cardiac-gated single-photon emission computed tomography myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) with thallium-201 (Tl-201) and technetium-99m-sestamibi (MIBI) protocols in different groups of patients, and compared the data between Tl-201 and MIBI. Two hundred and seventy-two patients undergoing dipyridamole stress/redistribution Tl-201 MPI and 563 patients undergoing 1-day rest/dipyridamole stress MIBI MPI were included. Higher mean stress ejection fraction (EF), rest EF, and change in EF (ΔEF) were noticed in the normal MPI groups by both Tl-201 and MIBI protocols. Higher mean EF was observed in the females with normal MPI results despite their higher mean age. Comparisons between the Tl-201 and MIBI groups suggested a significant difference in all functional parameters, except for the rest end diastolic volume/end systolic volume and ΔEF between groups with negative MPI results. For the positive MPI groups, there was no significant difference in all parameters, except for the change in end diastolic volume and change in end systolic volume after stress between both protocols. The Tl-201 provides comparable left-ventricular functional data to MIBI cardiac-gated single-photon emission computed tomography in patients with positive MPI results, and may therefore be undertaken routinely for incremental functional information that is especially valuable to this patient group.