Patent ID: 8425899

Claim:
A method of treating a progressive myocardial injury that is an adverse consequence of a vascular insufficiency affecting coronary circulation of a subject, comprising (a) first, acquiring from the subject, under sterile conditions, a population of mononuclear cells comprising CD34+cells; (b) second, sterilely enriching the population of mononuclear cells for CD34+cells, so that at least 70% of the cells comprising CD34+cells; (c) third, at least 24 hours after step (a), passing a first portion of the enriched population produced in step (b) through a catheter and confirming that (i) at least some of the cells passed through said catheter have CXCR-4-mediated chemotactic activity and move in response to SDF-1 in vitro; (ii) at least some of the cells passed through said catheter can form hematopoietic colonies in vitro; and (iii) at least 70% of the cells passed through said catheter are viable; (d) fourth, formulating for parenteral delivery through a catheter a sterile pharmaceutical composition comprising: (i) a second portion of the enriched population produced in step (b), which contains at least 0.5×10 6 potent CD34+/CXCR-4+cells that have CXCR-4mediated chemotactic activity and that move in response to SDF-1; and (ii) a stabilizing amount of serum of at least 10% relative to the volume of the sterile pharmaceutical composition, wherein the stabilizing amount is effective to retain the CXCR-4-mediated chemotactic activity and hematopoietic-colony-forming activity of the CD34+/CXCR-4+cells in the second portion of (d)(i); (e) fifth, administering the sterile pharmaceutical composition to the subject parenterally on a first infusion date; and (f) sixth, repeating steps (b)-(d), in order, and optionally step (a), at a plurality of infusion dates to treat ongoing vascular insufficiency affecting coronary circulation, thereby improving myocardial perfusion and preserving existing myocardiocytes and their function during the subject's lifetime.