Decades of Medical Dogma Challenged

“Medical Dogma”, those were the words used in describing medicine’s long held belief that the human heart is incapable of regenerating new heart cells.

According to several news articles, research scientists have now discovered that damaged hearts can repair themselves by growing new muscle cells. This discovery challenges decades of medical dogma, a belief system that states the heart is incapable of generating these new muscle cells.

The study appears in this weeks New England Journal of Medicine and according to reports, researchers now hope to find ways to eventually “boost the heart’s ability to mend itself after a heart attack or heart failure.”

Scientists now recognize that a “mechanism exists” which allows the heart to generate new cells, which for them, reportedly opens up new prospects for more therapies. A mechanism within your body that allows the heart to generate new cells, that’s cool.

According to an MSNBC article, one researcher summed it up as follows…
“The bottom line: We didn’t know before. Now we know that heart cells divide. If one could find a way to turn on this division, it would be very important.”

If scientists could find a way to turn this mechanism on, “it would be very important.” Apparently the body already knows how to turn this mechanism on, doesn’t it? How long has it been doing this? Since a few weeks before the study was performed or perhaps a bit longer then that?

Just imagine, a self-healing and self-regulating organism capable of building new heart cells, lung cells, kidney cells, and even brain cells. Yes, even brain cells. One researcher had noted that the brain was recently believed not to have the ability to regenerate, “but that is no longer true” stated the researcher.

How long do you think it takes a brain cell to send a message to a tissue cell and say, “let’s make some new heart muscle” and then for the heart muscle tissue cell to send that message back to the brain? Now, think about how many times a day your body does that along with performing trillions of other functions.

That’s very cool, and that’s innate intelligence at work.

MSNBC: Heart can repair itself, study shows
Yahoo News: Heart Shows Sign of Self-Repair After Heart Attack