FDA's Regulation of Regenerative Medicine including Stem Cell Treatments, Tissue Engineering and Gene Therapies

Stem cells harness the power to differentiate into numerous cells upon stimulation. This has led to their wide exploration across all of medicine, including high risk diseases. Of course, significant scientific breakthroughs in the use of stem cells to prevent, diagnose, and treat numerous diseases has caused numerous start-up companies to form. Despite, such promise, the FDA has yet to approve stem cell therapies for a wide range of diseases, except cord blood-derived hematopoietic progenitor cells for certain indications.

This tutorial will provide an historical context for the use of stem cells in medicine, where the field has been and where it is going. It will also provide the few examples of FDA approved use of stem cells in medicine and what is needed for the field to progress. For example, in 2006, the U.S. FDA implemented regulations governing the use of human cells, tissues, and cellular and tissue-based products in humans including bone, ligament, skin, dura mater, stem cells, cartilage cells, and various other cellular and tissue-based products. Currently, there is an ongoing debate in industry on how such therapies should be regulated, in particular by the FDA or under the practice of medicine, under federal law or state law, and as drugs or simply biologics.