Immune Therapy For Heart Failure Patients

Now I have to be honest, I have not heard a heck of a lot about this but I did find it interesting. Heart failure and your immune system…

In some cases of heart failure, it is thought to be linked to ones own immune system in that it causes damaging inflammation to its own tissue. This then weakens the heart even further and inhibits its contractility and efficiency.

The Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas has completed a study on over 1000 participants. They have attempted to reduce inflammation by “damping down” ones immune system.

The method involved taking blood from the patients, and exposing it to chemicals designed to change some of the body’s own immune signals, and boost anti-inflammatory signals. This kind of approach is called “immunomodulation”.

In certain patients with heart failure, the ones that did not have a heart attack, there was between 25% and 39% decrease in risk of death. That is certainly marginal enough to warrant more research. I suspect that we will see more of this in the near future.

via BBC.com