Cord blood services banking also known as cord banking is the banking of cord blood and placental blood containing stem cells which are the building block of blood and its main constituent cells namely RBC, WBC and Platelets.
The Cord blood cells stored over here are used in the process called stem cell engraftment used for treatment of various deadly diseases like leukemia, sickle cell anemia, cancer etc.
The cord blood cells are either obtained from umbilical cord at the time of birth of child by simple cutting the umbilical cord or from placenta of the pregnant women, when the foetus is still growing. The CD 34+ stem cell obtained in such a manner are then banked like that in blood bank by the cord blood services bankers.
The sample so collected is sent to such banks where generally RBC is taken out of the cord blood and cyropreservative added to it to withstand very low temperature. Afterwards the sample is gradually and slowly cooled to -96 degree centigrade temperature and then put inside liquid nitrogen tanks at -196 degree centigrade temperature, where it can be stored for years.
The cost of collecting and processing stem cell units is a costly one and is done separately for both placental cord blood and umbilical cord blood.
There are two types of cord blood stem cell banking services available in all developing and developed countries. These are private family cord blood banking and public cord blood banking.
Public cord blood services banking stores the donated cord blood for anyone who requires them for transplantation and treatment of about more than 80 diseases. These donated and stored cord blood samples are also unanimous.
However private cord blood services banking stores the cord blood samples for the use of donor or his family or his relatives and are identifiably kept with the bank. However these private cord blood banking services are changeable and costly.
The public cord blood banks require to be intimated by the donor of cord blood in the 34th week of pregnancy and the whole of the public cord blood banking is supervised and maintained under the control of National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP).
As the stem cells are responsible for the growth of all blood system, these stored cord blood are used for treatment of donor or relatives later, mainly for genetic diseases, blood related diseases and disorders as well as various types of cancer.
Further the cord blood transplant is an alternative to bone marrow transplant which is quite a painful process as well as not feasible in case of partial match. However partial match transplants are successfully done in case of cord blood. Cord blood transplant is also having a high probability for transplant match for not only lineal descendents but also the ascents. That is why the cord blood banking is also sometimes referred to as to “BIOLOGICAL INSURANCE”.
