Patient shows strong recovery after iPS-derived heart sheet transplant in Japan

A woman in her 50s from Kanagawa Prefecture became the inaugural patient to receive RiHeart, a cardiac muscle sheet created from donor induced pluripotent stem cells, at Osaka Keisatsu Hospital on September 29. About a week after the roughly 50-minute procedure, she said she could breathe more deeply and felt a noticeable difference, expressing a desire to walk her dog, run, and enjoy her hobbies. The operation was performed by Yoshiki Sawa, who serves as the hospital’s president and is a professor emeritus at the University of Osaka, highlighting the significance of delivering such a treatment at a midsize private facility.

RiHeart was engineered by the startup Cuorips Inc. to address severe heart failure linked to blocked coronary vessels, aiming to stimulate new blood-vessel growth and improve heart function. The therapy received conditional regulatory approval in March, with public health insurance coverage beginning in September, and the company plans to treat 75 patients and demonstrate efficacy by 2033. Researchers at Kyoto University's Center for iPS Cell Research and Application note that iPS cells can differentiate into virtually any cell type and proliferate indefinitely.