What are the advantages of cord blood?

Cord blood offers a number of advantages to donors and transplant recipients. It is easy to collect, more likely to provide a suitable match and is stored frozen, ready to use.

1. Cord blood collection is easy and risk-free.
Cord blood collection is a safe, simple procedure. The New York Blood Center's National Cord Blood Program staff collects cord blood from the delivered placenta, which does not interfere with the care of the mother or newborn baby. Collection, therefore, poses no risk to mother or baby.

2. Cord blood is collected in advance, tested and stored frozen, ready to use.
Cord blood is donated in advance for anyone who might need it in the future. All routine testing is completed and the unit is stored frozen, ready to use. If a match is found, it can be reserved immediately. Confirmatory HLA typing and any special testing required is usually completed within 5-7 days. Unlike bone marrow, there is no need to take time to locate a possible volunteer and then determine whether he or she is still willing and able to donate.

3. Cord blood doesn't require a perfect match.
The ability to transplant cord blood with only a partial donor-recipient match is its greatest advantage. Bone marrow usually requires a 6/6 HLA match between the donor and recipient. Cord blood has been transplanted successfully with as few as 3/6 matches, although patients do best when their cord blood graft is at least a 5/6 match.

Because partially matched cord blood transplants are acceptable, cord blood offers patients a better chance to find a suitable donor. With cord blood, a relatively small donor pool can effectively support most patients' needs. We estimate, for example, that a national inventory of 150,000 cord blood units would provide 6/6 or 5/6 matches for at least 80-90% of patients in the United States.

4. Cord blood poses fewer risks of certain complications to the recipient.
The immune cells in cord blood seem to be less likely than those in bone marrow from unrelated donors to attack the patient's own tissues (graft vs. host disease). Cord blood is also less likely to transmit certain viruses, like cytomegalovirus (CMV), a potentially lethal infection for transplant recipients. CMV is carried as a latent virus by about half of the adult U.S. population, whereas less than 1 percent of infants are born with CMV.

Stephen R. Sprague

Stephen R. Sprague was diagnosed with CML in 1995. Unable to find a matching marrow donor, he received a cord blood transplant in 1997.

A 2002 GAO Report (Possible Underutilization of the National Marrow Program) [click here to read the full report] describes the characteristics of searches, donors and conventional bone marrow transplants served by the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP). The GAO Report points out the problems some patients (especially ethnic minorities) have in finding matching bone marrow donors.

2002 US Government Accounting Office Report: Estimates for Bone Marrow Transplantation
The chart above summarizes the GAO's finding regarding equal access to a transplant by minority patients.

Cord blood, however, can be collected from specific hospitals serving mothers and babies that represent the ethnic diversity needed in the inventory. The high proportion of African-American patients among U.S. patients given cord blood transplants from our Program illustrates how minority patients benefit from this resource.

The chart below shows improved access to transplants for minority patients using the New York Blood Center's National Cord Blood Program.

Equal Access to a Transplant is Attainable