Sumitomo Pharma Performs World-First Stem-Cell Brain Surgery for Parkinson’s

Kyoto University Hospital Performs World-First iPS Cell Brain Surgery

A patient has received a world-first stem-cell therapy for Parkinson’s disease at Kyoto University Hospital in October, the Japanese drugmaker Sumitomo Pharma announced. The milestone follows conditional approval from Japanese regulators granted in March after a successful clinical trial. The treatment involves transplanting millions of induced pluripotent stem cells directly into the patient’s brain to target the root cause of the degenerative neurological disorder.

Parkinson’s disease affects more than ten million people worldwide, damaging the motor system and causing tremors and movement difficulties. Currently available therapies manage symptoms without slowing or halting disease progression. Sumitomo Pharma’s treatment uses stem cells from healthy donors that are developed into precursors of dopamine-producing brain cells, which are absent in people with Parkinson’s.

In the prior clinical study, seven individuals ranging in age from 50 to 69 were administered implants containing either five million or ten million cells bilaterally in the brain. They were monitored for two years, and researchers observed no major adverse effects while four patients showed improvements in symptoms. Sumitomo Pharma announced its plans to carry out transplants on 20 to 30 patients by March 2029. The firm is additionally testing the therapy in a United States clinical trial, and the medication will receive complete authorization in Japan once its safety and effectiveness are verified over the upcoming seven years.

Expanding Regenerative Medicine Trials Across Japan

The Parkinson’s announcement follows a separate medical milestone achieved a month earlier in Osaka, where a hospital carried out the world’s first surgery using sheets of heart muscle iPS cells to form new blood vessels and restore heart function. Japanese regulators also gave conditional approval to that cardiovascular therapy in March. Sumitomo Pharma did not disclose further details regarding the exact date or the identity of the patient who underwent the October procedure at Kyoto University Hospital.