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  1. #1
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    dirk diggler's Avatar
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    Stem Cell/Cord Blood Banking

    My wife was approached about this in the hospital the other day. I'm in Korea so I've been told to do my own research.

    Basically right after birth they will freeze and store blood from the umbilical chord and sometimes even part of the cord itself.

    This is completely safe and painless.

    The samples can then be donated or stored for personal family use at a cost.

    Cord blood stem cells have been used successfully to treat more than 70 different diseases, including some cancers, blood disorders, and immune deficiencies. Among these are leukemia, aplastic anemia, thalassemia, Hodgkin's disease, and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. (Cord blood stem cells have also been used to treat sickle cell anemia, but that procedure is not yet on the FDA-approved list.)

    Cord blood transplants are also used to treat rare metabolic disorders that would otherwise be fatal for infants (Krabbe disease and Sanfilippo syndrome, for example).
    Cerebral palsy and autism
    Children in clinical trials are being treated with their own cord blood for cerebral palsy, a condition that afflicts about 1 in 300 children in the United States. Children in clinical trials are also being treated with their own cord blood for autism, a condition that affects 1 in 88 children.

    Hydrocephalus, type 1 diabetes, and more
    Babies and young children in the United States are also being reinfused with their own cord blood stem cells in clinical trials to develop therapies for hydrocephalus (fluid in the brain), oxygen deprivation at birth, traumatic brain injury, type 1 (juvenile) diabetes, and congenital heart defects that require surgery. If the clinical trials are successful, these therapies may become commonly available within a few years
    Obviously, if this shit was free/cheap then everybody would be crazy not to do it. However, I would imagine not everybody in the family would be compatible depending on blood type. Obviously, and most importantly(?) your baby is compatible, however, some diseases will specifically require somebody else's stem cells.

    Is it best to be treated with your own stem cells?

    Not necessarily. It depends on the illness or condition being treated.

    When doctors use stem cells to help the body repair itself, the patient's own cells are ideal. There's no concern that his body will reject his own stem cells or react against them.

    But when the body is making the wrong cells – for example, if the illness is cancer or a genetic blood disorder – then the transplant must come from a donor, not the patient's own cells. That's because the patient's stem cells probably carry the same defect that caused the cancer or the genetic disease, and you'd be transplanting the seeds of the disease back into the patient.
    Some Points

    My wife has told me that the cost for this is around 85,000 baht. Although I am not sure if there is annual storage fees or whatever on top of that and I will not know until I get home.

    The 'company/hospital/clinic' offering this service offers a payment plan.

    It may not be compatible/someone else's stem cells may be required.

    We are covered with top class medical insurance that pays for everything directly without having to claim. If any of us needed it they would pay for a donor, but that depends on availability. This will end if my employment ends.

    I have already saved (due to insurance) around 50k in medical services for her pregnancy alone, and 5 months still to go.

    I'm definitely more for it since writing this.


    Has anybody got any experience with this, got any related stories?

    Thanks,

    Dirk.

    Info link - http://www.babycenter.com/0_cord-blo...-it_1362261.bc
    Lang may yer lum reek...

  2. #2
    RIP
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    Congratulations.

    Save your money, you'll need it when the baby comes.

    I considered it with my last born, but the cost on top of everything else ended the idea.

  3. #3
    Thailand Expat
    dirk diggler's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chittychangchang
    Congratulations.
    Cheers


    Quote Originally Posted by Chittychangchang
    Save your money, you'll need it when the baby comes.

    I considered it with my last born, but the cost on top of everything else ended the idea.
    Can you remember what the cost was?

  4. #4
    euston has flown

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    The problem is that should your child need a stem cell transplant, it will most likely be because there is an issue with the DNA in the stem cells.... therefor you would most definitely want to use someone else's stem cells rather than the one you've frozen.

    This is the problem with the kind of private sector medicine they have in the US, china, thailand and elsewhere. when the doctor is offering you something, is he being a doctor or a doddgy secondhand car salesman. I the case of stem cell freezing, he is most defiantly being the latter.

    To be honest, being chapble of serious breaches of social decorum, I've pointed out this doctor/doddgy car salesman duality issue to doctors and simply asked them do i really need this, or do you need the money from selling this for the down payment on your next merc. seems to piss them off for some reason.
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  5. #5
    On a walkabout Loy Toy's Avatar
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    Stem cells can be removed from your blood anytime and used to repair one's own injured body parts.

    Save your money mate.

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by dirk diggler View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by Chittychangchang
    Congratulations.
    Cheers


    Quote Originally Posted by Chittychangchang
    Save your money, you'll need it when the baby comes.

    I considered it with my last born, but the cost on top of everything else ended the idea.
    Can you remember what the cost was?
    No, too much stuff going on at the time.
    Just briefly flirted with the idea.

  7. #7
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    What would you get for them on Ebay?

  8. #8
    Thailand Expat
    dirk diggler's Avatar
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    Probably quite a lot if it was allowed.

    Private banking seems to be a waste of time. I will discuss with her about donating to a public bank if this is available, that way there is a guarantee that it will be used to treat somebody in need, successfully or otherwise.

    I'd have liked to see a public system, perhaps, where a person who has donated their stem cells for public availability would be automatically placed above those who haven't (but could have) in the case that they may require treatment. This would certainly improve the amount of treatment available.

    I think I could be on to something here.


    info link
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/ar...aste-time.html

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