Innovations in Regenerative Medicine

In this interview, Dr Sadick explores cutting-edge advancements in regenerative medicine, including PRP, exosomes, and cell banking, and their potential to revolutionize dermatology. Key insights are provided on emerging technologies and their future impact on patient care.

Neil S. Sadick, MD, FAAD, is a clinical professor of dermatology at Weill Cornell Medical College, and president-elect of the International Society for Dermatologic Surgeons in New York, NY.

Transcript

The Dermatologist: What current advancements in regenerative medicine are you most excited about, and how do you see them impacting the field of dermatology in the near future?

Dr Sadick: I think the most exciting areas of regenerative medicine that I'm most excited about and in dermatology and aesthetics are number one, the utilization of regenerative therapies like PRP or exosomes. Again, exosomes are small microparticles that contain biologically active growth factors and they are still being studied now in the early phases and PRP has much more history behind it. But I think that PRP is well established as a good treatment for slowing down hair loss and also used for facial rejuvenation and for anti-aging indications as well, either by itself or by laser or radio frequency procedures that we perform in our office. But I think exosomes really has the most potential because there’s a higher concentration of, again, these small microparticles, with higher concentration of growth factors in them. We need to learn and what sort of role that they will play. Another major area, again, is cell banking in regenerative medicine as well. Cell banking is where we actually, in the most present form now, remove some hair follicles from just do a hair pull for about 50 hairs from the back of your scalp.

Then the cells are banked, and sent to a cell banking, again, facility, either in California or at the University of Toronto and we're able to, again, take these products at any time in life and create a new skin care products for anti-aging or to stimulate hair growth and I think these are the most exciting new areas that I see that have some clinical applications in the near future.

The Dermatologist: Can you explain the role of stem cells in regenerative medicine and their potential applications for treating skin conditions and diseases?

Dr Sadick: The role of stem cell which come from multiple sources they can incur from humans, from bone-marrow, from fat cells, they can incur from animals, from plants, and I think that stem cells can be regenerated in specific organs or the treatment of medical conditions or for skin anti-aging rejuvenation as well. But I think they have the pluripotent capability of stimulating and renewing cell turnover and all of the signs of aging cells to rejuvenate the cells, either for aesthetic purposes or more seriously for treatment of medical conditions as well, such as paralysis. Stem cells are being used now in heart disease as well. So there's a lot of potential for both medical indications. But in dermatology, the major area where stem cells are being utilized as an anti-aging, again, for their anti-aging properties, as well for their hair growth stimulation capabilities.

The Dermatologist: How are regenerative therapies being integrated into clinical practice today, and what challenges do practitioners face in adopting these new treatments?

Dr Sadick: I think the issues, these regenerative therapy, PRP is now a well -accepted treatment for treatment of anti -aging or wound healing, which it has an FDA indication or after, again, laser procedures. Again, its role in treatment and slowing down in hair loss, it's still an evolution, but it's a relatively well -accepted type therapy.

Exosomes are very early. They're not FDA approved and should not be used in clinical practice to be injected, even for topical, cosmaceutical use. But more will be learned about that.

And there will be more, I believe, FDA studies that will move forward in the future. And they, I believe, will play an important role for us as well. And cell banking is the hot new area because we have cells that can be transformed into skin care products, hair stimulation products, and have a lifelong, again, potency, I think it's really a major advance in this area.

The Dermatologist: What emerging technologies or innovations do you believe will be pivotal in advancing regenerative medicine over the next decade?

Dr Sadick: I think the regenerative technologies that will help to advance this area in the future will be the ability to clone hair cells and maybe regrow hair cells. That's one area that's been looked at. We haven't quite perfected it yet, but the regeneration of hair cells is a major area.

I believe that further, again, improvements will be made and will be able to be utilized in clinical practice at some point in the near future. Again, we will have exosomes. We'll know more about them. Exosomes can also be derived autonomously from our own platelets. I think we're going to find out the best way to isolate exosomes, be it from ourselves or from other sources and also one of the most active growth factors that can be utilized to cause regeneration of the skin and for wound healing as well as stimulating hair growth. 

And I think cell banking, as we develop more products from our own cells, the ability to take our cells at any age, although it’s better to take our cells for banking purposes early in life and the ability to use these cells to develop new skin care products, new hair growth stimulation products, new wound healing products, and being used outside of aesthetics as well, those will be the major advances that we're going to see in regenerative medicine over the next several years.

The Dermatologist: How do you foresee regenerative medicine transforming patient care and treatment outcomes in dermatology? What are some long-term goals or visions you have for the field?

Dr Sadick: I think the major areas where we've seen regenerative medicine play a major role are, for example, after laser treatments to improve the results of laser treatments, to improve the downtime and to decrease the downtime after laser procedures.

We've already talked about these technologies being utilized to slow down hair loss, and possibly to induce hair regrowth as well. But I think the long-term goals of regenerative medicine using these technologies are: Number 1, to improve the results in terms of wound healing. Number 2, to shorten and improve the safety of the various laser and other aesthetic procedures that were performed. Number 3, to be able to stimulate more hair regrowth and maybe at some point, be able to achieve the results that hair transplantation surgery does. We’re not there today, but it’s something, it’s a goal that we may be able to achieve at some point in the near future. And then the ability to have our pluripotent stem cells banked and be able to use them throughout our life so we have an unlimited potential of cells that we can develop into skin care products, anti-aging products, wound healing products, if we need them, as well as part of our hair prevention loss, as well as stimulation-type programs.