Cord Blood - Donate or Let Baby Keep It?

[JoyNChrist]

I'm not entirely sure this is the right place to post this (I'm new here), so feel free to move it if necessary.


DH and I had discussed donating our newborn's cord blood, and it seemed like a good idea. We're not interested in private banking (way too expensive and the benefits are sketchy), but we're both blood and organ donors and thought that donating our newborn's cord blood for use or research would be a great way to possibly save a life someday.

But I recently read a Mothering article discussing the benefits of letting the baby "keep" the cord blood - not cutting the umbilical cord until it stops pulsing, thereby letting the cord blood travel into baby's system. Here's the section of the article I found most interesting...

"Because we didn't clamp or cut his cord, Jacob received his placentas final gift to him—a transfusion of an extra 100 milliliters or so of his own blood. This blood had been stored in his placenta and was designed to assist him at birth by filling the blood vessels in his lungs, kidneys, liver, gut, and skin—all the organs he hadn't used in utero—with oxygen-rich blood. Jacob's placental transfusion was also a safety net, able to tide him over if his breathing had not been established straight away.

If we had clamped Jacob's cord immediately after birth, he would also have missed out on the extra iron—about a month's supply—contained in his placental transfusion, as well as his own rich store of stem cells? Some experts in this area would add that we may have given Jacob protection from cerebral palsy, attention deficits, and perhaps even autism, because we allowed his brain to receive the full blood supply intended for him by Mother Nature. (Most of this extra blood is transferred in the first few minutes, but a longer delay in cord clamping—until the cord stops pulsing, or longer—allows the baby to regulate his or her own blood volume.)

All other mammals, and attendants in most traditional cultures, cut or bite through the baby's cord only after the placenta has been delivered—and with good reason. Jacob's placental transfusion reduced the size of his placenta by 100 ml, and my uterus was able to contract more efficiently around it, thus decreasing my chances of hemorrhaging. Jacob's less bulky placenta was also easy—and pleasurable—to birth."

Sound good, huh? But I'm wondering how true all of this is - do the benefits of letting baby keep the cord blood outweigh the possibility to save another's life through cord blood donation? I'm interested in reading more about the medical benefits if a newborn's cord-cutting is delayed until the UC stops pulsing. But so far I haven't been able to find much additional information. If anyone has an opinion or additonal articles that would help me make the decision, I'd really appreciate it.

(By the way, the full text of the article can be found here - http://www.mothering.com/articles/pr..._placenta.html - but I think I copied everything that references cord blood.)

Looking forward to hearing your opinions...TIA!

[RockStarMom]

I read that article during pregnancy, and did let my daughter's cord stop pulsing before cutting it. It just seemed natural to me too...cutting the cord was the last thing on my mind right after my daughter was born.

I don't really know much about how helpful cord blood can be...I would think that if it was really that needed it would be more common to donate it, and I had never even heard of that option. I'm curious to know about this though...

[rmzbm]

Let baby keep it.

[ccohenou]

It can certainly save lives under the right circumstances. I have read the threads of at least one mother around here whose child needs a stem cell transplant from cord blood. I don't know how many public cord blood banks are around or what it would take to donate to one. I wonder if it would be possible to draw a bit of cord blood from an umbilical vessel without cutting the cord, or after it has stopped pulsing? I don't think a great volume is needed...might be something to explore if you're interested in doing it.

[ASusan]

My friend's son had a cord blood transplant last year. He has a genetic disorder which would have resulted in death by adolescence. The transplant was his only option. It was a difficult year, and he's doing really well now.

I encourage people to donate when they can.

I would be torn between the decision to donate or let the cord stop pulsating. Unfortunately, I have a chronic disease that would keep us from donating. (although, fortunately, it makes the decision easy.)

[laohaire]

Keep. My baby drained her placenta DRY. She had to have needed it. The first days of life are so fragile, I would want to make sure a baby had everything she needed to meet that challenge.

I understand that other babies can be helped by the donation, but I say charity begins at home, so to speak. I protect my own child first, then I will reach out to others.

[kerikadi]

We let our babies keep their own cord blood. It just makes sense to us and we believe that there are many benefits.

Now, if I planned on birthing in a hospital where it is very unlikely a caregiver would allow all the blood to get to the newborn I would consider donating it. However, we birth at home and we don't clamp the cord until well after the placenta is delivered.

Keri

[Mama Poot]

With our first who was born in a hospital, my OB massaged the cord until it stopped pulsing then cut it. I'm glad my son got the infusion he needed from that but since it was rushed and forced, I think it caused his jaundice because his tiny system was inundated with red blood cells and he couldn't flush them out fast enough. With our second who was born at home, my midwife simply waited for the cord to stop pulsing on its own. It took several minutes. Ds#2 was never jaundiced. Either way, do NOT cut the cord immediately after birth. That is asking for trouble.

[Kundalini-Mama]

I am the family I think the other poster was referring to. It looks like my son will be having a cord blood transplant at Duke, unless, by the grace of whomever, his disease is mild and we will do just as well with weekly enzyme replacement therapy. If his disease is severe, the cord blood will save his life.

So, of course, I appreciate the donation of cord blood. Was my children's blood donated? No. Would I ever donate? Probably not as we homebirth, actually birth unassisted and I have no way to do it. Do I appreciate the other mamas who birth in hospitals and donate? More than anything.

Clearer than mud, no?

[JoyNChrist]

Just wanted to update a bit...

I've checked it out and cord blood donation is actually relatively easy, as long as your hospital/birth center and doctor/midwife are cooperative. If we go this route, we'll use the Babies for Life Foundation (check out this link if you're interested http://www.babiesforlife.org/reasons.asp). I truly believe that donation is a great thing (especially after reading your reply, Kundalini-Mama), and hope that we're able to do it.

Having said that, I'm still very interested in the benefits of letting the baby "keep" his cord blood. I currently have e-mails out to my hospital, doctor, and the Babies for Life Foundation, to see if it's possible to do both - let the cord pulse for a while, then draw the necessary cord blood for donation, or something like that. But I'm no expert, so I have no idea if that's possible.

I'm really hoping it's not an all-or-nothing kind of thing, because I'd like to give my baby the medical benefits and still be able to donate.

I'll let y'all know what I find out. And I'm still interested if anybody can find other articles that reference the medical benefits of not cutting the UC until pulsing stops.

[kerikadi]

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending a good friends birth. We share the same MW and they waited to cut the cord. Once the cord was cut the MW milked the cord from the placenta to where it was cut to try to collect blood to fill enough of a vile to type the baby's blood but there was barely enough to cover the very bottom of the vile, certainly not enough to test or to donate.
Now, there may be a happy medium but I am not sure you know where that happy medium is until after the fact. Maybe you think it's 5 minutes but then there isn't enough blood to donate.
Most places also won't take blood from an out of 'authorized' facility and my home certainly isn't so it's really a non issue for us.

I know donation can be very valuable which just makes me think that if it is valuable for someone else surely it holds value for my newborn. They have proven that cord blood is truly amazing - so why not let your child have it?

Keri

[KittyKat]

Let the baby keep it!

[GalateaDunkel]

Let the baby keep it. If you take the point of view that the baby is supposed to have it - it's their blood, after all - and that the whole clamping thing deprives them unnaturally of a fraction of their pre-existing blood supply, then donating it isn't really all that different from donating blood drawn from their body with a needle. In either case you are decreasing a newborn's natural blood supply for purposes of donation. I feel for people who benefit from the donations, and it's a good thing it gets donated if they're going to be cord-clamping anyway; but I also think it's unfortunate that their care providers put enough thought into the issue to collect blood for donation, but not enough thought to consider the benefits of letting the baby keep its full natural blood supply.

[Elyra]

Before my oldest was born I was asked if it was something I wanted to do. I was very young and this was way before I knew anything about natural birth or anything. I did infact donate his cord blood. (I didn't even know until recently about not cutting the cord until it stopped pulsing.) I have always been happy about it. We did look into donating our other children's cord blood, but we were not in areas where it was availble. As I remember they did get quite a lot of blood out of it, and there was a minimum needed. I could be wrong now, it was a long time ago. I am not sure that you would be able to do both based on that. Anyway, I felt strongly that if we weren't using it, it would be ashame to waste it when someone else might need it. But, I guess now that I know that a baby can benefit from it, I am a bit conflicted as well. I don't regret doing it by any means, I just may think more about it if I were to have another baby.

[mamato3cherubs]

Originally Posted by GalateaDunkel

Let the baby keep it. If you take the point of view that the baby is supposed to have it - it's their blood, after all - and that the whole clamping thing deprives them unnaturally of a fraction of their pre-existing blood supply, then donating it isn't really all that different from donating blood drawn from their body with a needle. In either case you are decreasing a newborn's natural blood supply for purposes of donation. I feel for people who benefit from the donations, and it's a good thing it gets donated if they're going to be cord-clamping anyway; but I also think it's unfortunate that their care providers put enough thought into the issue to collect blood for donation, but not enough thought to consider the benefits of letting the baby keep its full natural blood supply.

I wanted to agree with this post

[laohaire]

My mom pressured me to get the kit for private storage. She paid for it and everything. I was reluctant, and finally agreed that we would do it on the condition that we wait until after the cord stopped pulsating, as I originally planned.

There was no, repeat, NO, blood left to collect.

I think my mom suddenly saw it my way when that happened (she's an RN, and she was with me for my homebirth, and she herself tried to collect the blood after the cord was cut). I think she saw that the first minute after being born is not the greatest time to donate a fairly significant amount of blood. Anyway, it all worked out well.

The cord blood storage facility refunded us minus some basic processing fees ($100 or so, very fair). So if you want to try both approaches - donating or storing, plus waiting until after the cord stops pulsating, you can try. But from my experience, plus the handful of other experiences I've heard, you're not going to get enough blood - and that to me is all the reason more why we should wait to clamp and cut the cord (since obviously baby needs that).

[beachsea]

I am planning on speaking to my OB about this at the next visit. I want the baby to keep the cord blood. However, I am rh- and I have read that is the baby is rh+ there coulkd be problems with delayed cord cutting. Does anyone know?

I want to go into my visit informed so I make the correct decision, not what the doctor wishes to do. Any info would be great!

[kerikadi]

Originally Posted by beachsea

However, I am rh- and I have read that is the baby is rh+ there coulkd be problems with delayed cord cutting. Does anyone know?

I am Rh-, my last two babies are Rh+ and we delayed with no problems whatsoever. What problems have you heard? The only extremely rare issue with Rh factor is that your blood mixes before baby is born - it *can* be an issue for the NEXT baby if he/she happened to be -. I have had 4 live children and 2 miscarriages and still test negative for sensitization.

The blood in the cord is the same blood that the baby has been using in utero so no, there is no damage to letting the baby have his/her own blood.
I will warn you though that most OBs see no value in letting the cord stay attached because it is not standard operating procedure and nothing they have been taught about.

Good luck,
Keri

[MerelyGod]

I say keep it. It's there for a reason.

I didn't know that when I was pregnant though, and we donated the blood. I don't regret doing that, and I'm glad it was donated and didn't go to waste, but if I were to have another child, I would wait for the cord to stop pulsing.

Now that I know more about it, donating the cord blood seems sort of like donating your breast milk to another baby and feeding formula to your own.

I know some people have posted about their children receiving cord blood transfusions though, and I'm so glad it's available for them. I'm not really sure what to say about that. It's too bad that there doesn't seem to be a happy medium.

[catgirl1007]

I'm so glad this thread was started! I didn't know about letting the cord finish pulsating when I had DD and we had her cord blood retrieved and banked for personal use. We planned on doing the same thing with DS and actually have this all set up, but it never occurred to me that we couldn't do both (let it finish pulsating and collect for storage). I guess I have more "pregnancy brain" that I thought I did....