WOMEN with urinary incontinence have been successfully treated with stem cells taken from their own muscles, Austrian doctors reported yesterday.

The outpatient procedure for the treatment of stress incontinence, a type of urinary incontinence, takes only 15 to 20 minutes and many patients showed greatly improved control within 24 hours, the team from the Medical University of Innsbruck said.

Stress incontinence is a common condition and a big embarrassment for many women. As many as 1 in 5 women over the age of 40 suffers from some degree of incontinence.

“We believe we have developed a long-lasting and effective treatment that is especially promising because it is generated from the patient’s own body,” said Dr Ferdinand Frauscher, the radiologist who presented the results at a meeting of the Radiological Society of North America in Chicago.

About 15 million people around the world — primarily women — suffer from stress incontinence, the report said. The affliction causes urine leakage to occur when an individual exercises, coughs, sneezes, laughs or lifts heavy objects, thereby putting pressure on the bladder.

“Urinary incontinence is a major problem for women, and for an increasing number of men,” Dr Frauscher said.

The procedure involves removing stem cells from the muscle in a patient’s arm, culturing them in a laboratory for six weeks and then injecting them into the wall of the urethra and into the sphincter muscle.

Precise placement of the injections is critical, and was made possible by three-dimensional ultrasound techniques.

The aim of the procedure, so far carried out on 20 women aged 36 to 84, is to restore muscle mass and contractility.

“These are very intelligent cells,” Dr Frauscher said. “Not only do they stay where they are injected, but also they quickly form new muscle tissue and when the muscle mass reaches the appropriate size, the cell growth ceases automatically.”

Dr Frauscher said that the cost of the stem cell procedure was comparable to two popular treatments for incontinence: the use of absorbent pads; and collagen injections, the effects of which may not last beyond a year.

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