"A stem cell therapy developed by Vericel Corp helped reduce deaths and hospitalizations in advanced heart failure patients according to data from a midstage study potentially providing a treatment that could delay the need for heart transplants.  However the treatment failed to improve secondary goals of the trial such as heartpumping efficiency and sixminute walking distance and Vericel shares fell more than  percent by afternoon trading on Monday.  Its a little baffling that youre keeping patients alive but not having any effect on those secondary endpoints said Needham  Co analyst Chad Messer. People were looking for downside and they had one.  The data compared Vericels bone marrowderived ixmyelocelT stem cells with placebo in  welltreated patients with advanced heart failure who had exhausted medical and device therapies.  After one year the Vericel treatment led to a  percent reduction versus placebo in a composite of adverse events including death heartrelated hospitalizations and unplanned clinic visits related to heart failure.  Vericel last month reported that the study succeeded. Detailed results were unveiled on Monday at an American College of Cardiology meeting in Chicago and in the Lancet medical journal.  The result was primarily driven by the difference in deaths of . percent in the placebo group or  deaths compared with . percent or  deaths for the ixmyelocelT group. In addition  percent of stem cell patients required hospitalization versus  percent for placebo.   This is strong evidence in a welldesigned trial that we can decrease events said Dr. Timothy Henry the studys lead investigator and chief of cardiology at Cedars Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles. For patients this is a really hopeful thing.  Henry who presented the data at the ACC meeting stressed the need for larger trials to prove the benefit of ixmyelocelT  For the treatment bone marrow is taken from the patient and enhanced over two weeks to increase two types of cells associated with healing. They are then injected directly into the patients heart.  With advanced heart failure a leading cause of hospitalizations bloodpumping ability is diminished as the hearts left ventricle becomes enlarged and weakened.  If the disease worsens despite all available medicinal and interventional therapies the only options are heart transplant or a pumping assist device.  The idea is to find a treatment for this group of people before they get to that stage Henry said.  Vericel shares were down . or  percent at . on Nasdaq.  Editing by Bernadette Baum Our StandardsThe Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. httpthomsonreuters.comenaboutustrustprinciples.html"