News & Events: Fetal Immune System

"This group of vulnerable patients has been relatively ignored in the fetal surgery world," said UCSF's Tippi MacKenzie, MD, senior author of the new study and member of the Eli and Edythe Broad Center for Regeneration Medicine and Stem Cell Research, who has worked for a decade developing novel therapies for heritable diseases that can be treated before birth. "We know these patients could potentially benefit from a number of medical therapies. So this is our first foray into treating one of those diseases."

UCSF News reports on the first patient enrolled in the world's first clinical trial using blood stem cells transplanted prior to birth. The stem cell transplant was used to treat alpha thalassemia major, a blood disorder that is only detected in the last few months of pregnancy and has been almost uniformly fatal in the past. The clinical trial is led by Tippi MacKenzie, MD, an associate professor in the UCSF Division of Pediatric Surgery and co-Director of the UCSF Center for Maternal-Fetal Precision Medicine. The study is funded by a $12.1M grant from the California Institute for [...]

Pediatric Surgeon Tippi MacKenzie, MD was awarded $12.1 million by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to treat fetuses in the womb suffering from alpha thalassemia major, a blood disorder that is only detected in the last few months of pregnancy and is almost uniformly fatal.  Dr. MacKenzie, an associate professor in the UCSF Division of Pediatric Surgery and co-Director of the UCSF Center for Maternal-Fetal Precision Medicine, is using hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), taken from the mother's bone marrow, and transplanting them into the fetus before birth. The fetus's [...]

UCSF News reports on the work of a UCSF research team investigating the causes and potential treatments for gastroschisis, a rare disorder in which developing intestines protrude outside of the body through a hole alongside the belly button. Led by pediatric surgeon Tippi MacKenzie, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery in the UCSF Division of Pediatric Surgery and co-Director of the UCSF Center for Maternal-Fetal Precision Medicine, the team published findings elucidating the role of the immune system in the development of this potentially life-threatening disorder. UC San Francisco [...]