Advantages of Cord Blood Preservation

For preservation, umbilical cord blood is collected immediately after your baby is born and is then sent to an umbilical cord blood bank. The process of preserving umbilical cord blood in a bank is called cord blood banking.

Umbilical cord blood is the residual blood in the umbilical cord and placenta after your baby is born. It is a good source of stem cells. In fact, it is believed to be a better source of stem cells than bone marrow. The decision to preserve the cord blood cells should be taken during pregnancy, as it requires advanced preparation at the time of the child’s birth.  

Process of cord blood preservation

Immediately after your baby is born through vaginal delivery or C-section, the process of cord blood collection begins. Your baby’s umbilical cord is clamped and cut. A needle is inserted inside the umbilical cord to collect the blood, which is then transferred to a collection bag. The bag is then sealed and labeled, and placed inside a collection kit. The kit is then sent to the cord blood bank’s laboratory through a medical courier. In the laboratory, the stem cells are isolated through chemical processing. The cord blood is processed in a cord blood processing system. Once the processing is over, the umbilical cord blood is kept in cryogenic storage and preserved for future use.

Advantages of cord blood preservation

The advantages of cord blood preservation include:

• Cord blood stem cells can protect your baby and family members against 80+ diseases.

• More stem cells can be obtained from umbilical cord blood than from bone marrow.

• Umbilical cord blood stem cells do not have to match as closely as bone marrow stem cells during a transplant.

• There are fewer chances of the body rejecting the cord blood compared to bone marrow.

• There are lesser chances of getting graft versus host disease (GvHD).

• Through cord blood banking you can preserve biologically younger stem cells. These stem cells are more usable than adult stem cells collected from bone marrow.

• Cord blood stem cells can be used effectively for cancer treatments, mostly blood cancers or any diseases related to blood cells.

• Cord blood preservation can keep umbilical cord blood for a minimum of 21 years.

• If your family suffers from any genetic disorder, then umbilical cord blood preservation can be beneficial. 

• Leukemia, type 2 diabetes, sickle cell anemia, cerebral palsy, and Alzheimer’s can be treated with preserved umbilical cord blood.

Cord blood preservation is helping millions of people across the world to treat autoimmune diseases. Research is going on in the field of regenerative medicine to use umbilical cord blood to treat more diseases than now.