You can sell anything to new parents. They want to create a perfect world for their new baby, so they often tend to go overboard on things like strollers, cribs, mobiles, and clothes. Recently, an expensive new option for parents-to-be has come to market. It seems a little out there at first, but it has the potential to be the most valuable purchase/investment that a parent could make. It’s having your child’s stem cells banked at birth by freezing the blood from the umbilical cord. The mention of stem cells often creates a lot of controversy, but that’s almost always directed at embryonic stem cell research. There are plenty of other ways to procure stem cells—and umbilical cord blood is one of the best, especially for individual medical use. Stem cell therapies are still pretty uncommon, but the hope is that future therapies will be available to those who have had their stem cells banked—and there’s already a long list of diseases that have been treated with stem cells from cord blood. Cord Blood Registry in San Bruno, CA is the world’s “largest and most experience cord blood bank” having “already saved cord blood for more than 325,000 newborns.” Banking cord blood may not be all that common yet, but if you’re going to do it, it looks like Cord Blood Registry is the place to go.

Banking on the Future

Now, there are some people who criticize cord blood banks for taking advantage of naive parents and selling them an expensive product/service that isn’t really necessary. There may be some truth to that, but I’m sure the parents of children who were treated with stem cells from their cord blood are pretty happy with their investment. Now, there’s no way that I could explain the whole process of cord blood banking, but the Cord Blood Registry website does a great job of that. They have sections on Why You Should Bank Stem Cells, Why You Should Choose Cord Blood Registry, and a great database of Frequently Asked Questions. The site is extremely informative, even if it is focused on selling parents on the idea of cord blood banking. If you’re fascinated by what Cord Blood Registry is doing, then you’ll want to head over to their Jobs page. Right now they’re looking for a Client Support Representative, a Human Resources Coordinator, and an Associate Manager/Content Scientist. I wonder if employees get free cord blood banking for their kids?

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

• CordBlood.com
• Jobs at Cord Blood Registry
• About Cord Blood Registry
• Cord Blood Registry’s Management Team
• Cord Blood Registry’s FAQs
• Cord Blood Registry News
• Cord Blood Registry’s Blog

Would bank your child’s cord blood?

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