What is Cord Blood and Umbilical Cord Blood Banking

Cord blood, as defined by the Core Blood Donor Foundation, is the blood that stays in the umbilical cord after birth. The blood is taken from the cord and placenta after the baby is born, so the procedure itself is completely harmless to the baby as well as to the mother.

The Core Blood Donor Foundation states that cord blood is an excellent source of stem cells. Cord blood stem cells can be used to treat leukemia and other cancers in the same way that bone marrow is used, with a much less chance of rejection. So what’s a stem cell? Stem cells are special in that they have the ability to develop into many different types of cells within the body. The National Institute of Health claims that they are a repair feature for the body.

Stem cells that are collected from cord blood can be used to treat several types of disorders. These include several types of anemia, types of leukemia, as well as many inherited diseases. The list of diseases and illnesses that can be treated with stem cells extracted from cord blood is too large to include in this article.

                                   
After the umbilical cord is cut and clamped, the cord blood is collected with a syringe from the cord. Again, there is no harm to the mother or to the baby. The blood is then processed and stored in a umbilical cord blood banking . Different cord blood banks have different methods of processing, and different ways of storing the cord blood.

There are in fact many reasons to store your newborns umbilical cord blood. If your baby, or even a family member struggles with certain diseases, the cord blood stem cells can be used to treat them. As mentioned earlier, cord blood stem cells can be used instead of bone marrow with significantly less rejection. Umbilical cord blood can also be donated, instead of kept in a bank for a specific family.

Saving your baby's umbilical cord blood in a umbilical cord blood banking, allows to be cryogenically stored, and then available if your child later becomes sick and needs a bone marrow transplant. Umbilical cord blood was discarded until the 1970's, when researchers discovered that umbilical cord blood could save lives under certain circumstances.How do you decide on cord blood banking? Many soon-to-be parents ask this very question. Here are some things to consider when deciding on whether or not to bank your baby's umbilical cord blood
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This type of transplant would be 'autologous' and is different than the more common 'allogenic' transplants that might be done from a sibling or other relative or an unrelated donor. Our own blood is the best choice for a transplant.

Often times, cord blood banking can save a baby's life. But still, there are many other factors to consider. Price seems to be the number one roadblock, with the complete cost being around $3,000. So, you should certainly not feel guilty if you cannot bank your child's cord blood. Should you even consider umbilical cord blood banking? That part will be up to you. New England Cord Blood Bank , Cord Blood America, Cord Blood Registry are some of the cord blood stem cell banks
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However, if you already have a child or family member that has a condition that can be treated with a stem cell transplant (such as sickle cell anemia, thalassemia, aplastic anemia, leukemia, metabolic storage disorders and certain genetic immunodeficiencies), then you defenitely should consider banking your child's umbilical cord blood stem cell banking. However, the average baby without risk factors has a very low chance of ever needing his or her cord blood.

On the other hand, some doctors and researchers support saving umbilical cord blood as a source of blood-forming stem cells in every delivery. This is mainly because of the promise that stem-cell research holds for the future. The majority of people would have little use for stem cells now, but research into the use of stem cells for treatment of disease is ongoing - and the future looks promising.

You may also want to donate your baby's cord blood for cord blood stem cell banking. This is possible through non-profit cord blood stem cell banking that use it for research or to save the life of another child.

Overall, cord blood stem cell banking looks to have a promising future. It's defenitely an option you should look into. After you've studied the facts and your family history, you should be able to make a much more informed decision on what's right for you.

Stem Cells

Stem cells are the very early cells that can develop into almost all other types of cell and tissue. They occur in the early (5-day) embryo when it is a tiny ball of about 100 cells before it implants in the uterus (embryonic stem cells or "ES cells"). They also occur in significant numbers in some tissues in the developing fetus and in cord blood at birth. They can also be found in some adult tissue, e.g. bone marrow, but they are difficult to isolate, being present in very small numbers.

Stem cells are the “mother cells,” which give rise to all of the cells in the human body. Stem cells are at the forefront of one of the most fascinating and revolutionary areas of biology today. Scientists are rapidly discovering many revolutionary uses for stem cells, because they have the unique capability to either multiply or develop into other cell types. There are different types of stem cells. A “hematopoietic” stem cell is the type collected from the umbilical cord blood. Cord blood stem cells can multiply and develop into the major components of bone marrow, blood, and the immune system. Ongoing stem cell research is spawning ever-increasing knowledge about how an organism develops from a single cell, and most importantly, how healthy cells can replace damaged cells. This latter field is often referred to as regenerative or reparative medicine and stem cells are currently being used to treat more than 80 acute and chronic diseases.

Stem cells hold the potential of allowing researchers to grow and rejuvenate specific cells or tissues, which may ultimately be used to treat heart disease, stroke, Alzheimer's and many other diseases
                                                
Stem cells are defined by their unique ability to reproduce themselves and to develop through cell division into specialised cells which make up all the organs and tissues in the human body. Most regular cells are committed to a specific function, stem cells however remain undifferentiated, giving rise to particular types of cells under the right biological conditions.

Although often associated with early stage cells in the embryo and foetus, stem cells also exist in adult and young adult tissues. Adult and embryonic stem cells differ in important ways including their ability to reproduce under laboratory conditions, to differentiate into different cell types, to survive and function after transplant and to avoid immune rejection. Scientists are currently working to determine the extent to which these different cells types will be useful in treating human ailments.     
                                   
Adult stem cells are generally thought to be more specific than embryonic stem cells. They are found among specialised cells in a specific tissue and tend to develop into specialised cells closely related to that tissue type (e.g those found in blood may develop into red blood cells, white blood cells or platelets.) Adult stem cells are already being used in treatments for over one hundred conditions including leukaemia, Hunter’s syndrome and heart disease.

Embryonic stem cells on the other hand are obtained from undifferentiated cells in an early stage embryo and the range of specialised cells which they can give rise to is thought to be far more diverse. Embryonic stem cell research has yet to yield any clinical trials however many feel that it holds much greater developmental potential than adult stem cells.

Nonetheless, whether adult or embryonic, stem cells are the building blocks of life. They are the key to human development and act as the body’s in-house doctor, repairing diseased, damaged and lost tissue.

It is for this reason that researchers and clinicians have, and continue to, dedicate time and energy to understanding how stem cells develop. If this potential can be harnessed, stem cells may hold a cure to some of the world’s most intractable diseases including Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Motor Neuron Disease and Multiple Sclerosis.


Unique Properties of Stem Cells
                                      

Stem cells differ from other kinds of cells in the body. All stem cells—regardless of their source—have three general properties: they are capable of dividing and renewing themselves for long periods; they are unspecialized; and they can give rise to specialized cell types.

Scientists are trying to understand two fundamental properties of stem cells that relate to their long-term self-renewal:

i why can embryonic stem cells proliferate for a year or more in the laboratory without differentiating, but most adult stem cells cannot; and
ii what are the factors in living organisms that normally regulate stem cell proliferation and self-renewal?

Discovering the answers to these questions may make it possible to understand how cell proliferation is regulated during normal embryonic development or during the abnormal cell division that leads to cancer. Importantly, such information would enable scientists to grow embryonic and adult stem cells more efficiently in the laboratory Stem cells are unspecialized. One of the fundamental properties of a stem cell is that it does not have any tissue-specific structures that allow it to perform specialized functions. A stem cell cannot work with its neighbors to pump blood through the body (like a heart muscle cell); it cannot carry molecules of oxygen through the bloodstream (like a red blood cell); and it cannot fire electrochemical signals to other cells that allow the body to move or speak (like a nerve cell). However, unspecialized stem cells can give rise to specialized cells, including heart muscle cells, blood cells, or nerve cells.

Stem cells are capable of dividing and renewing themselves for long periods. Unlike muscle cells, blood cells, or nerve cells—which do not normally replicate themselves—stem cells may replicate many times. When cells replicate themselves many times over it is called proliferation. A starting population of stem cells that proliferates for many months in the laboratory can yield millions of cells. If the resulting cells continue to be unspecialized, like the parent stem cells, the cells are said to be capable of long-term self-renewal. The specific factors and conditions that allow stem cells to remain unspecialized are of great interest to scientists. It has taken scientists many years of trial and error to learn to grow stem cells in the laboratory without them spontaneously differentiating into specific cell types. For example, it took 20 years to learn how to grow human embryonic stem cells in the laboratory following the development of conditions for growing mouse stem cells. Therefore, an important area of research is understanding the signals in a mature organism that cause a stem cell population to proliferate and remain unspecialized until the cells are needed for repair of a specific tissue. Such information is critical for scientists to be able to grow large numbers of unspecialized stem cells in the laboratory for further experimentation.

Stem cells can give rise to specialized cells. When unspecialized stem cells give rise to specialized cells, the process is called differentiation. Scientists are just beginning to understand the signals inside and outside cells that trigger stem cell differentiation. The internal signals are controlled by a cell's genes, which are interspersed across long strands of DNA, and carry coded instructions for all the structures and functions of a cell. The external signals for cell differentiation include chemicals secreted by other cells, physical contact with neighboring cells, and certain molecules in the microenvironment.

Therefore, many questions about stem cell differentiation remain. For example, are the internal and external signals for cell differentiation similar for all kinds of stem cells? Can specific sets of signals be identified that promote differentiation into specific cell types? Addressing these questions is critical because the answers may lead scientists to find new ways of controlling stem cell differentiation in the laboratory, thereby growing cells or tissues that can be used for specific purposes including cell-based therapies.

Adult stem cells typically generate the cell types of the tissue in which they reside. A blood-forming adult stem cell in the bone marrow, for example, normally gives rise to the many types of blood cells such as red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. Until recently, it had been thought that a blood-forming cell in the bone marrow—which is called a hematopoietic stem cell—could not give rise to the cells of a very different tissue, such as nerve cells in the brain. However, a number of experiments over the last several years have raised the possibility that stem cells from one tissue may be able to give rise to cell types of a completely different tissue, a phenomenon known as plasticity. Examples of such plasticity include blood cells becoming neurons, liver cells that can be made to produce insulin, and hematopoietic stem cells that can develop into heart muscle. Therefore, exploring the possibility of using adult stem cells for cell-based therapies has become a very active area of investigation by researchers.