California's Alpha Stem Cell Clinics: A 21-Video Overview of the $40 Million Effort

The great mysteries and not-so-great mysteries of the stem cells and their likely applications are the subject of a host of videos drawn from a day-long meeting this month at the City of Hope in California.

The occasion for presentation of the clips on You Tube was a symposium on California's Alpha Clinic network, which is scheduled to expand from three to five sites this year. That will boost the state investment in the network to $40 million.

The March 23 session included discussion of the results of some of the research at the sites -- City of Hope, UC San Diego and UCLA/UC Irvine. Patients spoke as well, and there were discussions of the economic barriers involving commercialization of stem cell therapies.

Of particular interest was a nine-minute look at "stem cell therapy value and reimbursement considerations" by Jennifer Malin of United Healthcare.  That video is at the top of this item.

The Alpha network was initiated by California's $3 billion stem cell agency. Geoff Lomax, the agency's senior officer for strategic initiatives, presented an overview of the program. Below is a video of Bob Klein, the agency's former chairman, in which he indicates he will be backing a $5 billion bond measure to keep the agency going beyond 2020, when its funds run out.

Twenty-one videos are available. Here is a link to the agenda, which is useful as a guide to pick videos that are more likely to be relevant to a viewer's particular interests.