Five patients recently discharged from Hadassah Medical Center were healthy and coronavirus-free after taking part in the first clinical trial of an innovative treatment developed by the hospital.
Allocetra, the drug used in the clinical trial, was developed with the Enlivex Company based on research conducted by Prof. Dror Mevorach, director of the internal medicine and coronavirus departments at Hadassah. It had already been successfully tested on ten sepsis patients.
All five patients had been hospitalized in serious or critical condition.
“Allocetra is meant to treat a wide range of cases in which there is an overreaction of the immune system, which leads to an increase in the secretion of proteins by cells of the immune system called cytokines and causes a cytokine storm,” explained Mevorach. “Its activity is carried out by treating cells taken from a healthy donor and engineering them in the laboratory in a way that, when they are injected into the patient’s body, will control the inflammation or storm of cytokines that is very harmful to patients.”
The clinical test was carried out with the permission of the Helsinki Committee of the Health Ministry by a team led by Prof. Vernon Van Heerden, the director of Hadassah Medical Center’s General Intensive Care Unit.
“We are happy that the patients in severe and critical condition recovered after the Allocetra treatment,” Enlivex said.
“Despite the war around and alongside intensive preparations to absorb the growing numbers of critically ill patients, Hadassah continues to innovate and lead the breakthroughs in the treatment of these corona patients… [we] are pleased that a drug developed in research within the walls of our hospital does indeed show therapeutic potential in these patients,” said Prof. Zeev Rotstein, director-general of Hadassah Medical Center.
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“I hope that even those who must do their part in the budget and cash flow of the inpatient system in the country, will finally wake up and help us help the public at this time,” he said.
The Health Ministry reported 4,953 new cases of coronavirus on Wednesday with a new total of 239,806 infected since the outbreak. Among the sick are some 823 patients who are in serious condition, including 205 who are intubated. The death toll stands at 1,547.
The number of moderately and seriously ill patients is expected to continue to rapidly rise in the coming days and weeks, according to a model presented by experts at the Hebrew University on Wednesday. The model predicts that the number of serious cases will only begin to significantly drop after October 16.
While the rate of increase is expected to slow as the mortality of the outbreak increases, no significant slowing is expected. The mortality in Israel is higher than the model predicted, while the number of serious cases about matches up with the model.
The percentage of moderately and seriously ill patients who have died rose during September, as the time spent being hospitalized for patients who died dropped significantly. The Hebrew University report stated that this indicates a possible drop in the survival ability of the health system, either due to a failure to arrive for treatment or difficulties with treatment.
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