The treatment’s availability is extremely limited in the U.S. because there’s little scientific proof it works.

The result can be a classic battle, not unlike that which occurred in the early years of the AIDS epidemic, between desperate patients frustrated that therapeutic progress comes too slow and a medical establishment that insists there be ample evidence a therapy is safe and effective before making it widespread.

Read more at The Houston Chronicle.

Last spring, 50-year-old Steve Discher, military veteran, AECL employee, husband, father and grandfather was told he had an aggressive form of Alzheimer’s disease and had at best six to eight years to live.

His memory had already deteriorated to the point that he couldn’t write, remember what year it was, remember how to write out the numbers on a clock face or talk with friends and family.

Read the full article at The Daily Observer (Canada).

Still, Dawn couldn’t help but daydream about all the things she would do again. Like letting the red electric scooter — her primary method of conveyance these days — gather dust in a closet. Like breaking out the old cane she had so meticulously painted in the early days of her disease, when she could still get around on her own two feet. The source of all her suffering, multiple sclerosis, is a complex and so far incurable ailment with a maddening lack of scientific understanding. Dawn’s wish, by contrast, was simple.

“My goal is to use my cane and walk my kid into kindergarten,” she said.

Dawn’s is a particularly aggressive form of MS. It is characterized by a runaway immune -system response that causes nerve damage and, in the progressive stage, a rapid decline in mobility as the nerves that conduct signals from her brain to the rest of her body degenerate. Her doctors tell her the life she has now — constant pain, agonizing difficulty of movement — is as good as it’s going to get. The treatments currently available in the United States don’t work on someone as far along in the disease process as Dawn.

So the former Sony-BMG sales rep decided to leave the U.S. for Mexico, where she could buy a commodity in short supply back home: hope.

She paid dearly for it, too. By Googling “stem cells,” she found an intermediary who would set her up for a controversial treatment that is currently outlawed in the U.S. The intermediary — a company called Stem Cells for Hope — charged Dawn Gusty $27,000. In return, she hopped a plane to San Diego with her husband John, her two boys and her parents. Upon landing, the Gustys took a Ford Econoline van across the Mexican border into Tijuana — a historically friendly destination for medical tourists.

Read full article: Click here.

First, stem cells are immature cells that renew themselves for long periods through cell division.

Also, under certain  conditions, they can be “tricked” chemically to become cells that do special things, like become the beating cells of the heart muscle or the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas.

Doctors around the world are already using stem cells to treat diseases. No one is really sure if the treatments are safe and effective (by scientific standards). But many desperately ill and disabled patients travel many miles and spend many thousands of dollars to obtain these treatments.

This book of prayers is for those patients. But it is also for all patients now and in the future who seek relief from their diseases and disabilities through stem cell-based therapeutics.

Each day, people all over the world are moved to worship and adore God, and to acknowledge that they are dependent upon God.

The Gospels mention many times that Jesus himself often withdrew to quiet, desolate places to pray.

As St. Augustine once wrote, “He wishes our desires to be expressed in prayers so that we may be able to receive what he is ready to give.”

This Treasury of Prayers has four inspiring sections:

● Prayers Before Stem Cell Treatment (Contemplation and Decision);

● Prayers While at the Hospital or Clinic;

● Prayers for Patients with Specific Diseases, Conditions and Disabilities

● Scriptural Readings for the Spiritual Comfort of Stem Cell Patients.

To purchase at Amazon.com, click here.

For more information about “And I Shall Be Healed,” click here.

By Rebecca Todd, “Family on $80,000 stem cell mission”, September 22, 2009, © The Press,  Fairfax New Zealand Limited

By Michele Mandel, “Her Body Is Now Her Prison”, © 2009, The Toronto Sun

PRESS RELEASE from PRWeb, “Stem Cells for Hope Treats Two New Jersey Residents With MS”, Stem Cells For Hope, Walter Kravchenko, 631-929-3900