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Formula One great Michael Schumacher was admitted to a Paris hospital on Monday night for pioneering treatment.

The seven-time world champion, who turned 50 in January, has not been seen in public since a life-altering skiing accident in the French Alps more than five years ago, and his condition has remained a secret.

But it is understood the German was taken to the Pompidou hospital in southeast Paris in the afternoon where he will have stem-cell treatment carried out by French surgeon Philippe Menasche, a heart specialist.

Michael Schumacher was admitted to a Paris hospital for 'secret treatment' earlier on Monday

Schumacher was taken to the Pompidou hospital in southwest Paris on Monday afternoon

Schumacher pictured alongside his wife Corinna at the ski resort of Madonna di Campiglio

The 69-year-old medic is best known for performing the world’s first embryonic cell transplant on a patient with heart failure in 2014. 

Le Parisien newspaper reported: ‘It was at 3:40pm on Monday that a stretcher arrived on the first floor of the Georges Pompidou European Hospital.’

Schumacher was covered in a blue cloth that ‘completely covered his body and face,’ as he was taken into the Continuous Monitoring Unit of the Cardiovascular Surgery Department.

The security contingent was ‘made up of about ten people,’ the news outlet reported, adding that Professor Menache was ‘in charge of the group.’

Schumacher has not be seen in public since suffering the head injury while skiing in 2013

Schumacher poses with the Ferrari 248 during the launch of the new car in January 2006

WHO IS THE PIONEERING HEART SURGEON TREATING MICHAEL SCHUMACHER WITH STEM CELLS?

Dr Menasché is a world expert in stem cell treatment 

Michael Schumacher was admitted to Pompidou hospital in Paris to be treated by Dr Philippe Menasche.

Dr Menasché is a cardiothoracic surgeon who, with his colleagues, has long been working on using stem cells to repair damaged hearts.

Stem cells are not yet differentiated, meaning they have the potential to develop into many of the different types of cells and tissues in the human body.

Research on them has generated both excitement - that they could repair or replace damaged parts of the body - and controversy, because the most versatile stem cells are taken from embryos.

Dr Menasché and his lab work with a variety of cell therapies to treat heart diseases and injuries.

They first focused on a type of stem cells called skeletal myoblasts.

These stem cells are not as versatile as embryonic stem cells, but have can be taken from a patients own skeletal muscle.

Dr Menasché is treating Schumacher at Paris's Pompidou hospital

Scientists first started experimenting with transplanting these cells into the heart in 1995, in the hopes that they would help patients with heart disease or in heart failure to grow new, stronger tissue.

Dr Menasché's 2008 study in 2008 was one of the most well-regarded clinical trials of this method - but, ultimately, the procedure did not result in better heart function for the patients.

He has since moved on to a new technique. Dr Menasche now bioengineers tissue and uses it in combination human embryonic stem cells that are primed to become heart tissue, called cardiac progenitors.

In 2018, he published a study demonstrated that these cells could be safely transplanted into patients with failing left heart ventricles.

Dr Menasché's team aims to use their technique to treat patients in end-stage heart failure for whom more traditional treatments have failed - though it is unclear what stage these trials are now in.

Schumacher had originally arrived in a blue and yellow ambulance registered in Geneva. 

The treatment is believed to start as early as Tuesday morning, with Schumacher returning home on Wednesday.

In turn, Professor Menasche said details of Schumacher’s treatment would remain ‘secret’ for reasons of medical confidentiality.

According to other sources, Michael Schumacher made at least two visits to the Georges Pompidou European Hospital early this year.

On both occasions, he arrived by helicopter from Switzerland and landed at a heliport in Issy-les-Moulineaux, near Paris.

During his first stay in Paris, the patient underwent teats at the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital in Paris, but key work by Professor Menache was postponed.

Schumacher's spokeswoman Sabine Kehm declined to comment on the development. 

Schumacher in action during the Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Catalunya in April 2002

Schumacher has been recuperating at home in Switzerland since he hit his head at Mirabelle and is visited only by close friends, none of whom have divulged specifics about his state of health.

Sportsmail reported last December that although he is making slow progress, if any at all, Schumacher is not bed-ridden or living day by day on tubes.

He watches F1 races on TV, including with his friend and former Ferrari boss Jean Todt, the FIA president.

The skiing accident left him with severe head injuries and in a medically-induced coma for several months. 

In January his family released a statement saying he was in 'the very best of hands'.

The wall of secrecy, enforced at the request of his wife Corinna, was established to protect one of the biggest names in modern sporting times.

Schumacher's family are right to conceal his medical condition, Formula One's head of motorsport Ross Brawn has said. 

Brawn is one of only a handful of people to have visited the stricken driver as he recovers alongside his family in Switzerland.

Brawn, who helped mastermind Schumacher's success at Benetton and Ferrari, and has visited the former champion in Switzerland.

'I am constantly in touch with Corinna, and I totally agree with their decision,' he said.

'Michael has always been a very private person and that's been a guiding principle in his career, his life and his family always agreed with that choice.

'It's completely understandable that Corinna has wanted to maintain the same approach, even after the tragic event, and it's a decision we must all respect. 

'I'm sure the millions of people who are still Michael fans will understand it, too.'

Schumacher remains motor racing's most successful driver, with a record 91 Grand Prix wins. He won his first two titles with Benetton in 1994 and 1995 before five in a row with Ferrari between 2000-2004.