Cody in the Tribune

He was only a few days old and already has his name in the paper.


Cord blood donation program expands
By Heather May
The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 03/03/2009 01:43:17 PM MST


His umbilical cord blood kept Cody Hortin alive during his nine months in the womb. Now that he's out, the blood could be used to sustain someone else.
Soon after the baby was born Wednesday and after the cord was cut, a phlebotomist at St. Mark's Hospital drained the cord and the attached placenta of its blood. Rich with adult stem cells, umbilical cord blood is used as an alternative to bone marrow transplants and can be used to treat 70 diseases.
Since the donation didn't affect the birth or her baby, Michelle Hortin of Kearns had no qualms signing up to be a donor, especially because she is an organ donor herself and her father is alive because he received a donated aorta.
"I'm not sacrificing anything for my son and I'm helping other people," she said Friday while waiting to be discharged from the hospital.
Utah is one of 23 states with hospitals participating in the National Cord Blood Stem Cell Bank. The University of Utah launched the local program in 2007 and last week announced the addition of St. Mark's, which actually started collecting cord blood in August. Intermountain Medical Center, McKay-Dee, Utah Valley and LDS hospitals are expected to join as well.
That means more women delivering in the state's busiest labor wards will have the option to donate the cord blood, which is normally discarded.
"We have an incredible opportunity to save a life," said Marilyn Love, director of labor and delivery at St.
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Mark's. "It could be one of my family one day or it could be me [who benefits]."
The national cord blood bank is available to any patient across the country in need of a blood stem cell transplant. Because the stem cell bank is federally funded, donors are not charged to give or store the blood. In exchange, donors give up control of how the blood is used.
That's different than private banking of cord blood, in which parents pay to store the blood for potential use by family members. The service is offered in Utah through a for-profit private company called Utah Cord Bank. "Several hundred" Utahns have used the service, at a one-time cost of $940 plus $85 a year for storage, according to Eliott Spencer, a biochemist who owns the bank.
He said no client has used his or her blood, and Spencer said the chances are slim they would need it anytime soon. Instead, many are banking on technology coming up with new uses for the blood. Research is exploring using a child's own cord blood to treat cerebral palsy, brain injuries and type 1 diabetes.
Right now, the science is "a little bit of black magic," Spencer said. But "there are a lot of things that can happen between now and 10 years."
National medical organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics say claims that cord blood can be used as insurance against future illness are "unsubstantiated." It discourages the use of private banking unless a sibling has a disease that could benefit from a transplant.
For now, cord blood can only be used as an alternative to bone marrow transplants. Easier to match than bone marrow, cord blood is used to help recipients make new blood cells to replace ones destroyed after chemotherapy or radiation needed to combat diseases like blood-related cancers. It doesn't cure the disease.
Forty Utahns have received cord blood transplants at the U., said Linda Kelley, director of its cord blood program.
So far, the U. and St. Mark's have collected nearly 1,000 units of cord blood. About 60 percent are adequate to use for transplants and are sent to a bank in California. The rest are being kept in Utah for future research.
Nearly all of the women who are eligible to donate sign up, including Anna Jolley. Familiar with the benefits, as manager of the U.'s program, Jolley donated her daughter, Eva's, blood. Holding her 7-week-old, Jolley said she provided a "little miracle" to a stranger.
hmay@sltrib.com
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