“Latest Stem Cells News”

CHENNAI – The country’s first public stem cell bank has stopped accepting cord blood donations.

After processing and storing stem cells from cord blood of 569 women since February 2009, Jeevan Stem Cell Bank has put its operations on hold owing to lack of funds. The bank hopes that the situation will soon change, and it can restart operations once more donations come in.

Private banks charge anywhere up to Rs 1.5 lakh for extraction and preservation of these cells, but Jeevan, which started with an initial investment of Rs 3 crore, depends on public goodwill and corporate donations. The stem cells, capable of developing into different kinds of cells and tissues and curing diseases like blood cancer and thalassemia, were planned to be offered for common use.

When the bank began, it aimed at processing and storing at least 30,000 units of stem cells from cord blood by 2014, but for collecting and processing each unit, it cost the bank Rs 30,000. The cost of harvesting cord blood is Rs 8,500 and tissue typing costs Rs 7,000, besides others. “This wasn’t viable without more donations. We have stopped operations,” the stem cell bank’s medical director Saranya Narayan said.

Stem cells have a shelf life of 24 years. “As of now, there is good cure rate from stem cell therapy for some blood-related diseases. The cells may grow damaged tissues or organs. Stem cell therapy has the potential to cure more than 70 medical conditions,” she said.

Incoming search terms:

The King Abdulaziz Medical City in Riyadh is getting ready to open a stem cell bank harvested from the umbilical cord. The procedure will be done in laboratories and specially equipped rooms to draw the cells from umbilical cord blood and separate them using a special device.

Then they will be stored in labs for a period from 15 to 20 years after examining them and making sure they are free of contagious and genetic diseases. In addition, a team will be prepared for coordinating, marketing and research within this field.

Incoming search terms:

(…) Since 2006, according to NECBB records, the number of banked units used in transplants has doubled. The company attributes this increase in cord blood usage to the ever evolving research surrounding cord blood stem cells.

“We have always reminded parents that stem cell therapies are advancing very quickly and it is difficult to know what the possibilities are. The fact that more parents are using cells they stored suggests that the scope of treatments available is encouraging,” said Dr. David Matzilevich, Chief Scientific Officer of NECBB. “We are confident that the cells found in cord blood are extremely valuable and will only prove to be more so as time goes on.”

Over 80 diseases can be treated with the use of cord blood, including some types of juvenile diabetes and chronic leukemia. Cord blood collection poses no threat to the baby and therefore, circumvents the ethical issues of embryonic stem cells. The cells are taken from the cord after it is cut from the mother and baby.

For over 20 years, cord blood transplants have produced positive results. In 1988, a three-year- old girl received a cord blood transplant to treat Fanconi’s anemia. In 1991, another child was treated for myelogenous leukemia with cord blood stem cells and the transplant was a success. Since then, two-thirds of cord blood transplants performed have been for malignant conditions and overall have shown a high rate of success. The rising numbers of transplants reported by NECBB proves further that the achievements of cord blood banking will only grow (…)

from http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/165571.php

Incoming search terms:

Italy is the top country in the world for hematopoietic stem cell transplants per million inhabitants, said Alessandro Nanni Costa, the director of the National Transplant Center (CNT), presenting data today in Rome from a study by the Welfare Minister on umbilical cord stem cells.

Italy boasts a registry of 370,000 healthy adults available to donate blood stem cells.

The units of umbilical cord blood preserved in Italian biobanks number 17,503, while in 2008, only 141 were used in Italy or abroad.

The objective is to reach 80,000-90,000 units of umbilical cords preserved from which blood stem cells can be removed for transplants. In Italy there are 18 biobanks for the conservation of umbilical cords that must be reorganize and expanded to reach areas where there are no centers, such as Sardinia.

Incoming search terms: