The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute is researching a way of helping people who suffer from heart failure. Right now they’re trying to find to way for treating right-side heart failure.
The senior scientist from the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Dr. Lynn Megeney stated that in the last decade, although heart failure was referred to the muscles which got weak on the left side of the heart, 50% of the cases were due to a weaker right side.
Right Side Heart Failure Has No Effective Treatment
Dr. Megeney added that treating the right side of the heart is limited, the patients don’t have options on effective treatment, and they are usually hoping for a transplant.
According to a research which was published in Cell Research, something entirely different from drugs or surgical intervention was found to be helpful. That was a protein which the body produces when you exercise or during pregnancy.
The researchers studied diseased animal heart models and they inserted the protein called Cardiotrophin – 1 to see whether it works or not. Eight weeks after it was given, the heart muscle grew back to a healthy and normal size.
Dr. Megeney said that they observed the study and if the Cardiotrophin – 1 protein was administered, it induced heart growth. When they took away the protein, the heart’s state will revert to the initial size.
Clinical Trials for Human Patients Would Be Available in the Future
Researchers believe that what they found is very important and promising. They hope that in three or four years they would be able to conduct clinical trials on human patients and see if the results are the same.
If the results will be positive in human clinical trials, then this research could help millions of people who suffer from right side heart failure, allowing them to choose a different solution to heart transplants.