Umbilical Cord Stem Cells - Has anyone done this?

[Taia's Mum]

Hi Everyone,

Just wondering if anyone out there has kept their babies Umbilical cord stem cells?

Thanks!

Natty23

[melbel]

Not personally, cos I don't have children yet but I do intend to. My best friend has stored both her childrens cords through a company called cryotec...it cost about $1800 up till their eighteen then they have to decide what they want to do with it. Just as you are aware though....if your child does get an illness like say leukaemia they probably wouldnt use the child's own cord cells. This is because the genetic makeup that led to the leukaemia taking hold will still be in thoe cord cells IYKWIM and the leukaemia could come back at a later stage. Where stem cell storage really makes a difference is between siblings because the matches are so good but you can eliminate the bad stuff If you get what I mean. I hope that makes sense. I think it is a very worthwhile thing to do......my two cents worth.

[LisaL]

I am newly pg and the hospital sent me all the forms etc and included a form about cord donations, so I have agreed to donate the cord blood from my babies birth to a cord blood bank.

[BellyBelly]

One thing you need to be aware of is if you wish to donate cord blood, the cord needs to be clamped and cut right away at birth so they can have that blood. There are lots of studies that have shown allowing the cord to stop pulsating at it's own accord and your baby getting all its blood (including red blood cells, cancer fighting T cells etc.) that it provides months of iron stores and lower rates of anaemia to start with. It's quite a bit of blood, and I am aware there are great benefits in donating the cord blood, but I would much rather my baby get this important blood. That's something they may not tell you. I think it's ironic, that the cord blood stem cells have the cells which fight cancer, yet they are telling us to keep it out of baby until they get cancer? Even then, it's a select group of cancers and diseases cord blood replacement can work with, not all.

I've written the studies into an article here: Cord Blood - Why Delaying Cord Clamping Benefits Your Baby (which I recommend all parents considering storage have a read of).

How likely is it that my baby will need stored stem cells?

According to Dr Sarah Buckley, in her well researched book 'Gentle Birth, Gentle Mothering' (2005):

* The likelihood of low-risk children needing their own stored cells has been estimated at 1 in 20,000
* Cord blood donations are likely to be ineffective for the treatment of adults, because the number of stem cells are too small
* Cord blood may contain pre-leukemic changes and may increase the risk of relapse
* Autologous cord blood is only suitable for children who develop solid tumours, lymphomas or auto-immune disorders
* All other uses are speculative

Collection is also very lucrative for the collector (midwives get offered training in this too, some decline but some do it) and they get paid hundreds for doing the collection. Very sad, when the best thing for babies is what should be being promoted. I guess money speaks louder than words...

Here are some other very good links on cord blood and cutting the cord:

Don't Cut The Cord!
Five Good Reasons To Delay Cord Clamping
Early or Late Clamping?
Early Clamping of the Umbilical Cord
Risks of Premature Cutting of the Umbilical Cord

[Taia's Mum]

Kelly - Oh wow! I didn't know that! Now that really makes me think about what I want to do!

[penguin]

One thing you need to be aware of is if you wish to donate cord blood, the cord needs to be clamped and cut right away at birth so they can have that blood. There are lots of studies that have shown allowing the cord to stop pulsating and your baby getting all its blood provides 6-12 months iron stores and lower rates of anaemia to start with. It's quite a bit of blood, and I am aware there are great benefits in donating the cord blood, but I would much rather my baby get this important blood. That's something they may not tell you.

Hey BellyBelly,

Do you have any references for the benefits of allowing the cord to stop pulsating? Our bub is due in March and I'd be interested in checking this out.

[chant]

Hi,

Dr Sarah Buckley's "Gentle Birth Gentle Mothering" discusses the bolus of blood that the placenta delivers to the baby just after birth - boosts baby's blood by a third. I believe this happens within 3 minutes or so of the birth. This extra blood at birth helps the baby's body to deal with the new challenge of breathing, temp regulation etc.

But if one has the syntocinon shot after birth which causes the uterus to contract and expel the placenta, the cord needs to be clamped quickly otherwise the baby can receive *too* much blood.

[BellyBelly]

Effect of timing of umbilical cord clamping on iron status in Mexican infants: a randomised controlled trial.

* Chaparro CM,
* Neufeld LM,
* Tena Alavez G,
* Eguia-Liz Cedillo R,
* Dewey KG.

Department of Nutrition, Program in International and Community Nutrition, University of California, Davis, CA 95616-8669, USA.

BACKGROUND: Delayed clamping of the umbilical cord increases the infant's iron endowment at birth and haemoglobin concentration at 2 months of age. We aimed to assess whether a 2-minute delay in the clamping of the umbilical cord of normal-weight, full-term infants improved iron and haematological status up to 6 months of age. METHODS: 476 mother-infant pairs were recruited at a large obstetrics hospital in Mexico City, Mexico, randomly assigned to delayed clamping (2 min after delivery of the infant's shoulders) or early clamping (around 10 s after delivery), and followed up until 6 months postpartum. Primary outcomes were infant haematological status and iron status at 6 months of age, and analysis was by intention-to-treat. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT00298051. FINDINGS: 358 (75%) mother-infant pairs completed the trial. At 6 months of age, infants who had delayed clamping had significantly higher mean corpuscular volume (81.0 fL vs 79.5 fL 95% CI -2.5 to -0.6, p=0.001), ferritin (50.7 mug/L vs 34.4 mug/L 95% CI -30.7 to -1.9, p=0.0002), and total body iron. The effect of delayed clamping was significantly greater for infants born to mothers with low ferritin at delivery, breastfed infants not receiving iron-fortified milk or formula, and infants born with birthweight between 2500 g and 3000 g. A cord clamping delay of 2 minutes increased 6-month iron stores by about 27-47 mg. INTERPRETATION: Delay in cord clamping of 2 minutes could help prevent iron deficiency from developing before 6 months of age, when iron-fortified complementary foods could be introduced.

PMID: 16782490 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

[Schmickers]

Oooh, I'm sorry to raise this thread from the dead, but I just read it after linking from a cord blood discussion.

Caro, something important to note is that it is worth questioning exactly why the paediatrician needed to take move your baby. Was it in respiratory difficulty? Was it "stunned" (which basically means shocked by a fast or violent birth and slow to start breathing and moving)? In these cases, it is a reasonable alternative to ask that the baby be initially resuscitated on the bed between your legs, while still attached. This is because the cord will continue to pulsate, and your placenta will continue to supply your baby with oxygenated blood, for some time after birth. This is nature's way of compensating for a baby with respiratory difficulties - it gives it plenty of time to start breathing on its own.

A paediatrician probably won't be happy to do it that way, but it is my personal belief that it is foolish to cut off a perfectly good oxygen supply to a baby whose main problem is poor breathing.... I will try and find some research to support this, if you would like.

[BellyBelly]

Michael, feel free to post any research. You could probably hire your own paed so you can find out BEFORE the birth that they will support you, but logistics could be an issue I guess. Not that many babies do need a paed to be called. I've only seen it happen once.

[Schmickers]

Okay, preliminary research yields this page from gentlebirth.org:

http://www.gentlebirth.org/archives/cordIssues.html

At the very top of the page, there is a large study from the American Academy of Pediatrics that supports delayed cord clamping in a routine birth. This should be sufficient support to have your requests honoured if you desire late cord clamping. Now, off to find some more research about delayed cord clamping during resuscitative efforts...

A few references about the benefits of commencing resuscitative efforts while the cord is still pulsating...

http://www.obgyn.net/pregnancy-birth...-resuscitation
http://www.gentlebirth.org/archives/cordNFM.html

There are very good justifications for expecting that your baby will be resuscitated on the bed or floor, either between your legs, or on your belly, to maintain that lifeline of iron, and richly oxygenated blood. I have to say, doing this research has been enough to clarify it in my mind; I would certainly request, and expect, that a neonatal resus on any of my children would be performed while they were still attached to the placenta, and I would be willing to push that point with the paediatricians I work with. I doubt they'd agree, but you can't fight the research ...

Kelly, I'd be happy to help with your cord clamping article, and make the cord blood donation article either a part of it, or a separate one, if you'd like.

[Rouge]

Do you know whats funny though, we let the cord pulsate with Seth. But in all honesty if it didn't cost as much as it does I probably would consider cord blood storage.

*hugs*
Cailin

[poppi]

Hi everyone,

Sorry for a very late post however I thought it was worthwhile commenting on our experience. We collected the stem cells when we had our daughter. We were able to allow the cord to stop pulsating naturally itself and then the cells were collected. This option suited all our requirements however it is worthwhile noting that you are unlikely to get as large a collection of stem cells. This ultimately means that there are less stem cells being donated to research (a portion of all stem cells collected are donated to research involving stem cells).

We live in SA however when I was speaking to the company they advised that it is actually illegal in NSW to collect the stem cells prior to cessation of the cord pulsating (not sure if this is true or not but thought worth a mention). Of course they would prefer that we collected prior to the cessation of the cord pulsating so they would receive a larger research pool.

Hope this helps.

[Lulu]

Even if I wanted to I could not have collected as my kids weren't born during office hours!

[kirsty_lee]

Im the same as LisaL .. i've decided to donate my chord to the chord donation bank

[Lulu]

Just don't be dissapointed if you don't get the opportunity after all.
I wasn't told it wasn't possible bubs was born after hours or on weekends. I didn't mind as I was happier to delay the cord clamping in the end.

[poppi]

Hi Lulu,

Not sure which company you were thinking of using however it doesn't matter the day and time that the baby is born. There is a time limit on when they require the sample to be processed in the lab but it is the midwife (well in our case) that collects the sample after the cord stop pulsating. The company has a 24 hour service and the sample is picked up via a courier from the hospital and is transported via plane to the lab in Sydney. In the case of the company we used, it didn't matter when our daughter was born.

[Lulu]

Yeah, I was surprised too. I can't remember the name, but they had an office in the hospital, but only open office hours.