Author Topic: Richard M. Cohen, CHASING HOPE: A PATIENT'S DEEP DIVE INTO STEM CELLS... (Read 126 times)

agate · « **on:** April 30, 2021, 08:45:59 pm »

Richard M. Cohen, CHASING HOPE: A PATIENT'S DEEP DIVE INTO STEM CELLS, FAITH AND THE FUTURE (2018)

This book by an author who has had MS for decades is a report on his venture into the promising new world of stem cell treatments for MS--a venture for which he has to have been more courageous than many of us would be, for the treatment's benefits are still debatable.

Along the way, he is concerned about hope. Can one have hope without faith? He interviews assorted people, such as Rabbi Kushner (author of When Bad Things Happen to Good People) and TV anchor Tom Brokaw, struggling with multiple myeloma.

His enthusiasm for stem cells began when he and his family attended a conference on stem cells at the Vatican. Soon he was in the hands of Dr. Saud Sadiq of the Tisch MS Research Center in New York, and he has clearly become a disciple of Dr. Sadiq, whose name is well known in MS research.

The treatment he received, which he describes in some detail, was part of a Phase I clinical trial involving some 20 patients. He does not say so in so many words but the results seem to have been disappointing, for he acknowledges that the improvement he noticed was only modest and may have been temporary.

There was a 2-year follow-up of that clinical trial that makes it sound as if stem cell treatment may not deliver very encouraging results:

https://www.tischms.org/phase-i-published-results-2-year-follow

The author has done a great service for everyone with MS by his willingness to undergo this experimental procedure and by his clear presentation of the account of that experience.

agate · « **Reply #1 on:** May 01, 2021, 09:36:11 pm »

I wrote these comments back in 2008 but apparently I didn't include them on the earlier version of this board.

BLINDSIDED: LIFTING A LIFE ABOVE ILLNESS: A RELUCTANT MEMOIR (2004)

The author, who happens to be married to Meredith Vieira, the TV news broadcaster and talk-show host, was also in the TV news business until multiple sclerosis and other disorders entered his life. He tells his story, with considerable discussion about the impact of his illness on his wife and three children. After the MS diagnosis, he was found to have colon cancer, which returned later. The surgeries and their complications, and the pain of the colon cancer, made their family life difficult, but Richard Cohen takes a wryly humorous view of himself and freely owns up to his mistakes. His father is a doctor who also has MS, and his grandmother had MS as well (although she apparently never realized it).

This is a well-told and honest account of coming to terms with chronic illness.

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Author Topic: Richard M. Cohen, CHASING HOPE: A PATIENT'S DEEP DIVE INTO STEM CELLS... (Read 126 times)

agate

Richard M. Cohen, CHASING HOPE: A PATIENT'S DEEP DIVE INTO STEM CELLS...

agate

Richard M. Cohen, BLINDSIDED: LIFTING A LIFE ABOVE ILLNESS--A RELUCTANT MEMOIR (2004)

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