Latest Parent's Guide to Cord Blood Brochure

I was most pleased to receive Dr. Frances Verter's email informing me yesterday that the Parent's Guide to Cord Blood Brochure (many months in the making) was now available online to download. She's done a wonderful job putting the decision making process into perspective and the artwork is simple but very tastefully done.

You can get a copy of the brochure at this link. It is currently available in three languages.

Irish Medicine Board Consults Professor Colin McGuckin on Cord Blood Stem Cells

NEWSFLASH: UMBILICAL CORD STEM CELL BAN MAY BE LIFTED

Since Prof. Colin visited us in April this year and shared with us the difficulty of convincing medical experts that cord blood stem cells provide a real alternative to bone marrow and are able to produce various cell lineages, I was most delighted to see that Irish Authorities are finally acknowledging that cord blood stem cells are useful and can be banked for their citizen's use (see previous entry on Cavan General Hospital).

Ireland has pretty high incidences of cancer, inline with the rest of the world, although the treatment of it may be restricted due to the available medical facilities and services offered to the patients. Ireland has one of the worst cancer survival incidences in Europe.

If you're wondering if cord blood stem cells really can be used in cancer treatment in adults, have a look at this article citing one of the world's most famous transplanters, Prof. Mary Laughlin who is the haematologist and oncologist at Case Comprehensive Cancer Center and University Hospitals of Cleveland Ireland Cancer Center.

Just in case the article is taken offline, the article is below:

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By Fiachra O'Cionnaith

Friday July 18 2008

Official policy banning the retrieval of cord blood stem cells at Dublin's three main maternity hospitals could be set to come to an end under new Department of Health plans.

Since August 2005, official policy at the Rotunda, the Coombe and the National Maternity Hospital has meant that requests from new mothers for medics to retrieve stem cells from the umbilical cord have fallen on deaf ears.

But after confirmation from the Department of Health that it has met with international experts over the possibility of creating a public cord blood stem cell bank for medical and research purposes, the official policy ban may now be overruled.

Since the cord blood stem cell retrieval technology became a reality, a wide-ranging international debate has raged over the use of stem cells obtained in this way.

Those in favour of the medical technique say that cord blood stem cells significantly improve the chances of using the stem cells in question to help treat future medical conditions in the newborn baby or their relatives.

Ethical

But opponents have countered by pointing to ethical concerns over the use of cord blood stem cells and have added that there is not yet enough long-term research to support the claims made about the technique.

As a result of the increased profile of the cord blood stem cell retrieval -- which has been used in over 10,000 births, mainly in the US -- a rising number of Irish mothers have asked for the procedure when giving birth.

Until recently, they have been told the matter was against hospital policy at Dublin's three maternity hospitals, with a formal policy clarification signed by the Masters of the Rotunda, the Coombe, and the National Maternity Hospital in August 2005 noting: "There is insufficient scientific research to support the procedure of taking cord blood for stem cell retrieval. The three maternity hospitals do not support requests to take core blood for stem cell retrieval."

However, speaking to the Herald today, the head of the Irish Patients Association Stephen McMahon said that the Department of Health is now considering plans to potentially bring the policy to an end.

The Department of Health has confirmed that after consulting international experts on the matter it is now considering establishing a public bank for the storage of cord blood stem cells for medicinal and research purposes.

It is continuing to hold meetings with "relevant" interest groups on the matter.

Last week the Department, the HSE, the Irish Blood Transfusion Service and the Irish Medicines Board met with international expert Professor Colin McGuckin of the Institute of Human Genetics at the UK's Newcastle University to hear the benefits of freezing cord blood cells for future use.

The international expert said that the only major hurdle to the plans was the current financial restrictions in the health service.

- Fiachra O'Cionnaith

Blogging Live from Singapore at the UK-Singapore Stem Cell Symposium

Its been a long time since I sat in a room full of developmental biologists discussing the intricate biochemical pathways -some discovered and debated heatedly- and listened to the fundamental scientific research performed in the UK.

Organized by A*STAR’s Singapore Stem Cell Consortium and the British High Commission at Singapore’s Biopolis, it was another event which made evident Singapore’s financial commitment to establishing a scientific research base through educating its PhD students and motivating local researchers to aspire to international knowledge standards. Since I did spend a few years in a research position in Singapore, it is only right that I promote their efforts in scientific education.

15 scientists (of which 7 were Professors and researchers from their respective departments) from the Universities of Cardiff, Cambridge, UCL, Sheffield and Edinburgh presented a thirty-five minute summary of their work involving stem cell pathways derived from embryonic cell lines and cancer cells.

All the presentations were very technical (as they should be) and involved the investigation of signaling pathways in the cell.

For those who are less scientifically inclined, signaling pathway research, in plain language is finding out how a cell talks to another cell, and how each of the cells respond in body language according to what is said. Imagine that a cell is itself made up of many components (kind of like organs within your body) and these components need to synchronize in order to regulate and make the cell what it is, or what it is to become. In this case, the researchers were trying to find out which factors affect the embryonic stem cells and make them change or “differentiate” into a specialized cell type.

As always in basic scientific research, as long as governments don’t run dry on funding, scientists will always have work to do because we are still a long way off understanding how our cells talk to each other, and most importantly how to control unnecessary conversations which may spark off a chain of unwanted reactions.

You can find the list of speakers and topics here, and for the sake of brevity and also without having to go into too much basic cell biology, I’m going to give you an outline of a few of the talks which I find easier to explain and are relevant to the faithful readers of this blog. I've chosen 4 presentations (Prof. Tariq Enver, Dr. Phil Jones, Dr. James Hui and Prof. Pete Coffey) to share with you and you'll find them in the ensuing entries.

The Best Gamble in Las Vegas: Bet on Your Stem Cells

Neostem, a company formerly known as Phase3Med, based in New York (USA) which collects and stores adult stem cells has been around for quite a while. One of their directors was here in Malaysia 3 years ago at one of the locally organized biotech symposiums and expressed a certain interest and admiration for the work that we have accomplished thus far.


LAS VEGAS MEDICINE

After a short hiatus about two years ago where there was a change in management and ownership, the company has started to make regular press announcements about their expansion of collection services in the US in collaboration with aesthetic doctors. Neostem held a press conference last Friday (Oct 23rd) which was sponsored by the Nevada Development Authority and the University of Nevada and a few local companies. Neostem used the opportunity to present to the Nevada Biotechnology and Bioscience Consortium to educate the region's medical and scientific community.


The collection site is apparently sited near the Nevada Cancer Institute and the Nevada Neurosciences Institute. Its CEO Robin Smith said that its expansion in Las Vegas was quite obvious given the large size of the city's population, its tourist attraction status and that tourists also visit for the health and spa-oriented services offered by the hospitality industry. Neostem's target clients for adult stem cell banking include anyone concerned with their long term health or well-being. They are also targeting people concerned about possible exposure to radiation.



MONEY MATTERS

Neostem listed on the American stock exchange on the same day as the Nevada announcement, is unfortunately already trading down and has a market capitalization of 14 million USD. The rapid expansion over the last three years has been loss-making for Neostem (approx. twenty million US dollars) according to its last audit in March. Most of it was operating expenses (expensive infrastructure and qualified personnel requirements).


However, medical director of the Las Vegas facility, Dr. Ivan Goldsmith expressed his enthusiasm to target both residents and tourists and convince them that storing their own stem cells for their future might be a better bet than the gaming tables.


He said: "The odds are far greater that you will eventually be a winner having your stem cells banked"



StemLife offers adult stem cell collection and banking in Malaysia and Thailand. If you're in the region and interested in this service, give us a call. :)

Adult Stem Cell Education Video

Did you like the animated graphics in the video in the last entry? Here's another one by the same author on adult stem cells and what they can do. It's just as good as the previous video and I think its really worth watching it once or twice just to make sure you don't miss anything..

I particularly liked the depiction of stem cells in the bone marrow, how the stem cells form matured red blood cells and how they move into the bloodstream to perform their function in circulation. The narrator also made a good point about how stem cells are important to the body in replacement of lost tissue either due to wear and tear, or by medical damage (say treatment by radiotherapy or chemotherapy). Essentially, if your stem cells are totally destroyed, all the parts will wear down really fast; And if you have the choice to keep a small bank of replacement cells in the event that it does happen, wouldn't you do it?

Drop us a line if you'd like to get your own stem cell account- StemLife makes the process as pleasurable as possible.

Take it from me... I've already banked mine ;)



Turn your speakers on and press play.......

Video on the Characteristics of Stem Cells

It isn't very often that one finds a good video explaining what stem cells are and what they do. I found this very short one on Youtube and found the graphics animation really quite impressive and visually stimulating. If you're a client of StemLife, I'd really like you to watch this and share this blog with your family and friends so that they can understand stem cells better.