Umbilical Cord Blood Transplant
This paper is a little bit controversial, even when in recent times more and more research and applications for stem cells taken from the cord blood have been studied. The list of threatening-life diseases that can be treated with this kind of umbilical cord blood transplant is long and goes up to nearly 75 disorders, and new studies using stem cells from the blood cord are being applied to regenerate heart tissue after a heart stroke, and also to treat diabetes 1. The potential use of stem cells is still unknown, however many studies are being conducted worldwide at the same time.
However, and according to the statistics, the chance of a child who is developing a disease that can be treated using stem cells taken by umbilical cord blood transplant has been estimated at less than 1 in 10,000; and some experts think it is even lower. Also, we would almost never use a child's own cord blood for this kind of transplant in case of childhood leukemia, because the leukemia would almost undoubtedly be present in the cord blood.
As a conclusion, storing your child's own cord blood is really only meaningful when there is a child in the family who already has, or has had, leukemia or any other disease which can be treated with the stem cells present in the umbilical cord blood; transplant then is a reasonable alternative. Under these circumstances, the chance that the new baby will be a perfect match for his or her sick brother or sister is of one-in-four. Therefore, this figure is definitely worth going for. Any family involved in this particular situation, should talk to their child's oncologist in order to discuss all the alternative options and treatments available, including cord blood banking. You can also have your oncologist contact us, or your nearest Hospital Bone Marrow Transplant Program to get all the information and recommendations needed to make an umbilical cord blood transplant successfully as part of the treatment of your sick child.
However, if luckily, you are not in this special and very high-risk group, and still deciding to save the cord blood for your family anyway, there are private companies which will preserve your cord blood. Fees charged by this kind of companies could be quite expensive and with a new baby on the way, you should ask yourself if perhaps there might not be better ways to save its life, you could invest that money. Nevertheless, in order to possibly save a person’s life, also thinking on donating the cord blood to a public bank can also be an option. This alternative is for free, and it is also a wise and altruist option, instead of throwing away the cord blood as traditionally has been done.