Gil Seton's Blogspot: 2021

Monday, July 19, 2021

Hearts with Hope - Saving Children

Gil Seton, a manager at SP Investment Fund LLC, a company that invests in real estate and technology with an eye toward its social impact, resides in Los Angeles. When away from work, Gil Seton has a variety of charitable interests and has engaged with many nonprofit organizations such as Operation Smile, Women’s HIV Program of the University of California at San Francisco, and Hearts with Hope.

The Hearts with Hope Foundation is a nonprofit that provides medical and dental care along with humanitarian assistance to children with heart disease in underserved communities around the globe. Founded in 2005, Hearts with Hope helps children with congenital heart disease in a variety of ways. The foundation helps individuals without the resources to care for themselves, as well as educates healthcare professionals in the disadvantaged communities the children reside in.

The foundation provides life-saving pediatric surgery to children in developing countries, and also trains local doctors on how to perform these procedures. Without Hearts with Hope, the children they serve would not have access to these critical life-saving surgeries.

Wednesday, July 7, 2021

HepaTx Develops Effective Alternative

A real estate investment professional with more than three decades of experience in affordable housing, Gil Seton serves as a manager of SP Investment Fund, LLC, a Los Angeles, California-based investment firm. As the manager of the firm, Gil Seton oversees the investments of SP and its affiliates in affordable housing developments and emerging technology and biotechnology startups that will benefit society, such as HepaTx.

A regenerative medicine technology pioneer, HepaTx is working on a cutting-edge therapy for liver diseases that rely on stem cells. With this therapy, patients with late-stage liver disease can avoid liver transplants. In the United States, over 30 million individuals are diagnosed with liver disease and live less comfortably. Each year, about 7 percent of the affected population develop end-stage liver failure, which necessitates transplant for the patients' survival.

A liver transplant is not available to all patients. Approximately, only 3 percent of patients in need of the surgery have access to the treatment. As this is a matter of life and death, finding promising alternatives is critical. HepaTx's solution replaces the lost regenerative capacity of a defective liver. With this, the liver may recover its vitality and become a healthy organ again.

Monday, June 28, 2021

HepaTx Develops a New Treatment for Liver

Gil Seton is a real estate investment expert with more than three decades of professional experience in the industry. Since 2003, Gil Seton has served as manager of SP Investment Fund, LLC in Los Angeles, California. The company invests in affordable housing communities and has expanded into investing in early stage technology and biotechnology startups, including HepaTx.

A biotechnology company specializing in creating stem-cell treatments that will provide an alternative to liver transplants, HepaTx developed an innovative therapy for end-stage liver diseases that can potentially save lives. The existing gold standard treatment for severe liver disease (organ transplant) is expensive and only available to a fraction of the population who need the treatment.

According to HepaTx findings, a direct infusion of stem cells into the liver can replace diseases and dead liver cells. Once the stem cells are manufactured, they can be banked and distributed to hospitals and facilities where they can be used. Tests using mouse models have proven zero tumor risks and shown promising physiological efficacy of the infused stem cells (hepatocytes).

The new therapy, SF-Heps, is a licensed three-part process. It starts with isolating stem cells from discarded lipoaspirate, followed by manipulating the chemical compound of the cells into functional liver cells. The last step involves the infusion of modified stem cells into portal veins for engraftment.