Can Skin Cells Repair Damaged Heart Tissue? Rambam Medical Center Study

People who suffer from heart failure could someday be able to use their own skin stem cells to regenerate their damaged heart tissue, according to a new Israeli study. Researchers took stem cells from the skin of two patients with heart failure and genetically programmed them to become new heart muscle cells. They then transplanted the new cells into healthy rats and found that the cells integrated with cardiac tissue that already existed.