Therapeutic Potential of Mesenchymal Stem Cells in the Treatment of Epilepsy and Their Interaction with Antiseizure Medications

Abstract

Epilepsy is a life-threatening neurological disease that affects approximately 70 million people worldwide. Although the vast majority of patients may be successfully managed with currently used antiseizure medication (ASM), the search for alternative therapies is still necessary due to pharmacoresistance in about 30% of patients with epilepsy. Here, we review the effects of ASMs on stem cell treatment when they could be, as expected, co-administered. Indeed, it has been reported that ASMs produce significant effects on the differentiation and determination of stem cell fate. In addition, we discuss more recent findings on mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in pre-clinical and clinical investigations. In this regard, their ability to differentiate into various cell types, reach damaged tissues and produce and release biologically active molecules with immunomodulatory/anti-inflammatory and regenerative properties make them a high-potential therapeutic tool to address neuroinflammation in different neurological disorders, including epilepsy. Overall, the characteristics of MSCs to be genetically engineered, in order to replace dysfunctional elements with the aim of restoring normal tissue functioning, suggested that these cells could be good candidates for the treatment of epilepsy refractory to ASMs. Further research is required to understand the potential of stem cell treatment in epileptic patients and its interaction with ASMs.

A Severe Alzheimer’s Disease Patient Improved by Intravenous Mesenchymal Stem Cell Transplant

“…Recent clinical trials of anti-A β antibodies reported that deterioration of clinical symptoms was slowed, but symptoms themselves were not improved [ 24 , 25 ], while it was not yet clear whether anti-tau treatments also can improve clinical symptoms [ 26 , 27 ]. Notably, in other neurological diseases, such as stroke, traumatic injury, and epilepsy, MSCs have been shown to perform therapeutic effects through attenuating neuroinflammation as well as inducing angiogenesis [ 28 – 30 ]. Neuroinflammation as well as vascular dysfunction or blood-brain barrier (BBB) breakdown is thought to be involved in the pathogenesis of AD [ 31 – 33 ].…”

Stem cell technology for antitumor drug loading and delivery in oncology

“…Other drugs: during the last few years several other antineoplastic drugs have been studied as potential carriers by MSC; in a preclinical study by Kosaka et coll., concurrent administration of 5-fluorocytosine and MSC bound to cytosine deaminase led to significant survival improvement in rats with gliomas [ 23 ]; similarly, Ryu et coll. disclosed that thymidine kinase loaded MSC by herpes simplex I virus improved overall survival in a similar population of mice [ 24 ]. Xiao et al reported that silica nanorattle-doxorubicin compounds can be fixed to MSC in nanoparticulate patches which are able to migrate towards U251 tumor cells both in vivo and in vitro [ 25 ].…”

Three-Dimensional Cell Cultures: The Bridge between In Vitro and In Vivo Models

“…In the light of this recently acquired knowledge, regenerative medicine of the NS is emerging as a new challenge for the scientific world. Current studies showed that stem-cell-based therapy can offer beneficial effects for several NSDs, such as stroke [365][366][367], epilepsy [368,369], PD [370][371][372], and other chronic neurodegenerative disorders. Organoids containing neural stem cells and neural progenitor cells are proposed as rich sources of autologous cells and tissue transplantation.…”