Cord Blood Developments

Imagine that, despite a baby being born with a rare and often fatal disease, the cure was born previously with the baby’s sibling.

Hurler syndrome is an inherited disorder where a child has a deficiency of a key enzyme needed to break down complex sugars (called glycosminoglycans.) The buildup of sugar results in progressive organ deterioration and ultimately, death in childhood. The symptoms may only appear after age 3 and after the brain has already undergone damage.

According to a study published in the Annals of Neurology, treatment of Hurler syndrome with umbilical cord blood transplantation before 9 months of age leads to normal cognitive development.  Early transplantation also predicted better outcomes for language skills and adaptive behaviors.  More specifically, children transplanted at 12-25 months of age functioned cognitively at a level 2 to 5.3 years below that of those transplanted at 4 months.
 

Reflecting on her pregnancy 35 years ago, Marion Welch recalls her obstetrician inquiring about family health history. Originally, her family had a clean bill of health, however, a turn of events revealed a predisposition to macular degeneration and Parkinson’s disease. This realization spurred her advocacy for cord blood banking and education. With over 175 clinical trials underway, cord blood's role in regenerative medicine has expanded, offering hope for future generations. Marion shares the importance of educating expectant parents about cord blood banking, regretting not doing so herself. Today, with increased affordability and legislative support, cord blood banking presents a viable option for securing future health.

My name is Justin Fuller and I am a Senior Client Coordinator and Training Coordinator at Cryo-Cell International.  I have been involved in the cord blood banking industry since 2008, and have seen it progress dramatically over the past several years; especially with regenerative therapies such as cerebral palsy.

My older sister was born with cerebral palsy, the leading disease that cord blood stem cells have been used to help treat for the past 20 years.  She struggled when we were in childhood to do many of the simple things that other children took for granted, and many times all I wished I could do was change that.

I may not have been able to reverse her diagnosis, but I was able to do the next best thing.  Educate her on the one time opportunity to capture lifesaving cord blood stem cells that could be used to help safeguard her family and two sons. 

The ultimate goal of all cord blood banks when processing is to get the most cord blood stem cells possible that will work when needed. To achieve this goal there are many steps that come prior to that final cord blood stem cell collection going into the freezer.  Collection, transportation, processing, freezing and storing all contribute to the overall quality of the cord blood product. Any one of these steps, if not done correctly, could result in a once in a lifetime collection being unusable.

Our commitment to quality shows in Cryo-Cell’s choosing to follow the Quality Standards of AABB, FACT and ISO 9001. To us, this means that we go through rigorous evaluations of our quality system (audits) by the best people in our field to ensure that we are applying the most up to date quality procedures.
 

A new scientific study at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and University of Ottawa has revealed the answer: as people age, the stem cells in their bodies decrease in number.*  Therefore, the ability for the body to repair muscle damage also decreases because the reservoir of muscle precursor cells available to differentiate into muscle cells has gradually been dropping.  What causes this reservoir of stem cells to decrease?

According to the researchers who conducted this study, there is a signaling pathway from tissue that surrounds the stem cells which acts like a taxi dispatcher.  A taxi dispatcher determines whether a particular taxi cab should go to the north or the south for its next passenger. In this case, the tissue, or our taxi dispatcher, emits a molecule that tells the cell to stop dividing into one new satellite stem cell and one new muscle cell but rather to divide only into cells that can become muscle fiber. Over time, this decrease in the stem cell population means that there will be a reduced capacity to repair and rebuild muscle tissue.

Saneron CCEL Therapeutics, a Cryo-Cell International affiliated company, along with a group of researchers and colleagues of the University of South Florida has participated in a new research study of human umbilical cord blood stem cell’s treatment of stroke. In collaboration with the Henry Ford Hospital’s Neurology Department, Saneron concluded that human umbilical cord blood stem cells have a positive neuro-restorative effect on the post-stroke brain in diabetic rats. 

Right now, the above title is not a reality; however, in the not too distant future it may. About one month ago, I underwent a complicated surgery on my knee, and I can tell you that ever since the injury, I have been dreaming about how much easier life would be if our cord blood and cord tissue stem cells could be used to regenerate damaged ligaments and cartilage.

Cryo-Cell was recently invited to attend a conference held in New York City sponsored by the Alliance for Regenerative Medicine. This conference brought together leading regenerative medicine and advanced cellular therapy companies to share plans for and results from clinical trials that mainly use stem cell-based therapies to treat numerous diseases, ranging from oncology and cardiovascular to neurologic. 

Hypoxic-Ischemic Encephalopahy (HIE), also known as Perinatal Asphyxia, is brain injury caused by asphyxia.  It is caused primarily by systemic hypoxemia (low blood oxygen) and/or reduced cerebral blood flow.  Birth asphyxia causes 23% of all neonatal deaths worldwide.

Cryo-Cell strongly encourages our clients to not only enroll in our superior cord blood banking service but to also take advantage of the once in a lifetime opportunity to cryopreserve their baby’s cord tissue stem cells at birth as well. By collecting and processing a 4-8 inch segment from the whole umbilical cord, Cryo-Cell is able to cryopreserve the optimal sample size and composition without selecting and discarding valuable cell types.