Should You Bank Your Babys Cord Blood?

What Is Cord Blood Banking?

Cord blood banking is a process of collecting potentially life-saving stem cells from the umbilical cord and placenta and storing them for future use. Stem cells are immature cells that can assume the form of other cells.

There are so many things to think about when you have a child. One of them is the blood from your baby’s umbilical cord (which connects the baby to the mother while in the womb). It used to be thrown away at birth, but now, many parents store the blood for the future health of their child. Should you do it?

What Can It Be Used For?

The umbilical cord fluid is loaded with stem cells. They can treat cancer, blood diseases like anemia, and some immune system disorders, which disrupt your body's ability to defend itself.

The fluid is easy to collect and has 10 times more stem cells than those collected from bone marrow.

Stem cells from cord blood rarely carry any infectious diseases and are half as likely to be rejected as adult stem cells.

How Do You Get It?

If you want the blood stored, after the birth, the doctor clamps the umbilical cord in two places, about 10 inches apart, and cuts the cord, separating mother from baby. Then they insert a needle and collect at least 40 milliliters of blood from the cord. The blood is sealed in a bag and sent to a lab or cord blood bank for testing and storage. The process only takes a few minutes and is painless for mother and baby.

The cord blood bank may also send tubes so that the mother’s blood can be taken, too. If so, the banking kit will have instructions along with blood collection tubes.

Where Is It stored?

There are three options:

Public cord banks don't charge anything for storage. Any donation made is available for anyone who needs it. The bank may also use the donated cord blood for research.

Private (commercial) cord banks will store the donated blood for use by the donor and family members only. They can be expensive. These banks charge a fee for processing and an annual fee for storage.

Should You Bank Your Baby's Cord Blood?

It depends on who you ask. Although commercial cord blood banks often bill their services as "biological insurance" against future diseases, the blood doesn’t often get used. One study says the chance that a child will use their cord blood over their lifetime is between 1 in 400 and 1 in 200,000.

What the Future Holds

No one knows how stem cells will be used in the future, but researchers hope they may be used to treat many conditions, like Alzheimer's, diabetes, heart failure, spinal cord damage, and others.

It's possible that storing your child's cord blood cells now may be useful one day in combating these diseases. For now, these treatments are only theories. It's also not clear if stem cells from cord blood -- as opposed to stem cells from other sources -- will be useful in these potential treatments.

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