Thursday, March 4, 2010

Cord Blood Question

Mommy has a question for the other Mommies out there. For a while now Mommy has been debating about what to do with Jellybean's cord blood. The options would be 1) nothing 2) banking the cord blood 3) donating the cord blood and 4) letting the cord pulse out giving it all to Jellybean. Mommy ruled out option one as she thinks thats a big waste. Daddy has strong feelings against option four after talking to the Dr who said there is no medical evidence to prove this does anything beneficial for the baby. So Mommy and Daddy narrowed it down to options two or three, banking or donating. Banking is a big topic these days due to the banking companies touting the life saving miracles cord blood banking can provide but comes with the hefty price tag. Mommy has read lots of information talking about cord blood banking being a scam and how they only keep the blood for so long, it can only be used for a limited number of diseases, if you really need something hospitals will provide it from free banks, etc. On one hand Mommy realizes that Mommy and Daddy are genetically very distant from one another so in that sense it probably increases the odds that Jellybean and siblings won't inherit any genetic disease. Also Mommy's side of the family is rather healthy only having a maternal aunt with breast cancer who survived. Other deaths in the family on Mommy's side are more related to cancers that sprung up due to smoking and the same goes for Daddy's side of the family. So as a whole it seems both Mommy and Daddy come from healthier stock. Mommy's one question though is the fact that Jellybean and siblings will be mix babies will this make it harder or easier for them to find matches if they do get sick? Mommy knows that minorities always have a harder time finding genetic matches but what about mixes? Also will banking be beneficial for Mommy and her Mommy as being minorities the genetic pool is smaller so maybe it would be better to have this insurance policy of Jellybean's cord blood? Mommy isn't sure. Mommy decided to also go ahead and look into donating as an option. She contacted the local collection bank only to hear from them they are no longer taking donations for the year! What? I thought that marrow, blood, etc was always needed and thats why they have drives asking people to come out to donate so why would they turn away a donation? That doesnt make any sense at all. So what did all of you do with your babies' cord blood?

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