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World J Stem Cells. Jun 26, 2020; 12(6): 488-499
Published online Jun 26, 2020. doi: 10.4252/wjsc.v12.i6.488
Strategies for treating oesophageal diseases with stem cells
Yang Gao, Shi-Zhu Jin
Yang Gao, Shi-Zhu Jin, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, Harbin 150086, Heilongjiang Province, China
Author contributions: Gao Y wrote the manuscript; Jin SZ designed the outline; All authors approved the final version of the manuscript.
Supported by the Special Distinguished Younger Funding at the Second Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University.
Conflict-of-interest statement: There is no conflict of interest associated with any of the senior author or other coauthors contributed their efforts in this manuscript.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Shi-Zhu Jin, MD, PhD, Chief Doctor, Professor, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, No, 246 Xuefu Road, Nangang Distract, Harbin 150086, Heilongjiang Province, China. drshizhujin@hrbmu.edu.cn
Received: February 14, 2020
Peer-review started: February 14, 2020
First decision: April 29, 2020
Revised: May 2, 2020
Accepted: May 19, 2020
Article in press: May 19, 2020
Published online: June 26, 2020
Processing time: 132 Days and 8.5 Hours
Abstract

There is a wide range of oesophageal diseases, the most general of which are inflammation, injury and tumours, and treatment methods are constantly being developed and updated. With an increasingly comprehensive understanding of stem cells and their characteristics of multilineage differentiation, self-renewal and homing as well as the combination of stem cells with regenerative medicine, tissue engineering and gene therapy, stem cells are playing an important role in the treatment of a variety of diseases. Mesenchymal stem cells have many advantages and are most commonly applied; however, most of these applications have been in experimental studies, with few related clinical trials for comparison. Therefore, the methods, positive significance and limitations of stem cells in the treatment of oesophageal diseases remain incompletely understood. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to review the current literature and summarize the efficacy of stem cells in the treatment of oesophageal diseases, including oesophageal ulceration, acute radiation-induced oesophageal injury, corrosive oesophageal injury, oesophageal stricture formation after endoscopic submucosal dissection and oesophageal reconstruction, as well as gene therapy for oesophageal cancer.

Keywords: Stem cells; Oesophageal diseases; Differentiative capacity; Regenerative medicine; Tissue engineering; Gene therapy

Core tip: Stem cells have many characteristics and can be used to treat various diseases. Currently, the use of stem cells for the treatment of oesophageal diseases is developing but is still not very common. Therefore, this paper summarizes the relevant literature on stem cell therapy for oesophageal diseases, including oesophageal ulceration, acute radiation-induced oesophageal injury, corrosive oesophageal injury, oesophageal stricture formation after endoscopic submucosal dissection and oesophageal reconstruction, as well as gene therapy for oesophageal cancer, to promote better the development of stem cell therapy for oesophageal diseases.