The Year 2020 Sets the Record for the Cord Blood Samples Called for Treatment
In 2020, the call ratio for withdrawals of cord blood samples (the number of transplants performed) for treatment purposes from the Gemabank® – Russian cord blood bank – was 1/815. Five years earlier, it was 1/1190.
According to Alexander Prikhodko, the General Director of International Medical Center of Biomaterials Processing and Cryostorage LLC (IMCB LLC, MOEX: GEMA), HSCI’s subsidiary, operating Gemabank®: “2020 has become a record year for the number of cord blood samples called for treatment. For the treatment of cerebral palsy, clients were given 6 samples of umbilical cord blood, for the treatment of autism — 2. All transplants were performed as part of clinical trials and were successful. One of the samples was used abroad (in Georgia).”
According to the Ruscord Association, 11 private cord blood banks are currently operating in the Russian Federation, among which Gemabank® has a leading position. As of January 2021, Gemabank® holds more than 31,000 cord blood samples. For the entire period of work, 38 samples were called for treatment. Some of them were used for transplantation in Russian medical institutions, and some — in foreign ones. Of these, 5 samples were called for the treatment of diseases of the blood and the immune system (leukemia, neuroblastoma, Fanconi anemia, Shwachman-Diamond syndrome), the rest were mainly used for the treatment of cerebral palsy and autism.
About 600,000 samples of umbilical cord blood are processed and put for storage in biobanks annually in the world. The calls for samples from private banks is an important indicator of the cord blood banking industry development and reveals the readiness of the healthcare system to use this biomaterial. The calls for samples from Viacord, one of the largest cord blood banks in the United States and in the world, is 1/1000. This bank stores 470,000 samples and 500 transplants were performed.
According to Ivan Potapov, the head of Gemabank’s laboratory: “There is a trend in the use of cord blood in regenerative medicine, including in our country. In our opinion, over time, the number of such transplants will grow, which will have a positive effect on the image of bio-insurance”.
The gradual increase in the number of calls for cord blood samples stored in banks is related to several factors. First, it is the development of new areas of regenerative medicine where cord blood stem cells are used. Second, it is the increasing age of the «depositors» of cord blood banks. It is known that the disease incidence increases with age, especially in the field of oncology and those diseases where methods of regenerative medicine are used. Accordingly, under the age of 20, the percentage of use of this material is relatively low. But as the “depositors” grow older and with the introduction of new therapies and increase in the efficiency and safety of transplantation as a method of treating cancer, hereditary, autoimmune and other diseases, the number of calls for cord blood stem cells from banks will only increase.
Gemabank® also notes a more than 2-fold increase in the number of stored samples of mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) isolated from umbilical cord and umbilical cord tissue — now Gemabank® stores about 2,500 such samples. Experts associate such dynamics and interest in this service with the boom of new clinical trials in the world using umbilical cord MSCs, including for the treatment of acute respiratory distress syndrome in coronavirus infection.
The umbilical cord contains mesenchymal stem cells. They are able to differentiate into various types of cells and have a unique secret that can stimulate tissue regeneration, have a powerful anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory effect. After transplantation, MSCs are able to migrate directly to the sites of injury (inflammation). Also, mesenchymal stem cells are perfectly scalable in culture, allowing in vitro to increase the therapeutic doses required for transplantation. All this makes MSCs an extremely promising tool for cell therapy, which has been confirmed by numerous publications (over 100,000) and clinical studies (over 900).
Reference Information:
Umbilical cord blood contains hematopoietic stem cells. These cells are the source from which all cells of the hematopoietic and immune systems, as well as some other types of cells, develop. If for some reason a person’s immune and hematopoietic cells are severely damaged (for example, as a result of chemotherapy), then with the help of hematopoietic stem cells transplantation, as a kind of insurance reserve, it is possible to restore and «reboot» the patient’s entire hematopoietic and immunity system. Today, hematopoietic cell transplantation is used to treat oncohematological diseases (leukemias), blood diseases (for example, various kinds of anemia), the immune system diseases, as well as some hereditary diseases. In addition, the usage of umbilical cord blood cells are actively introduced into regenerative medicine for the treatment of cerebral palsy, autism, and stroke.
The umbilical cord contains mesenchymal stem cells (MSCc). They are able to differentiate into various types of cells and have a unique secret that can stimulate tissue regeneration, have a powerful anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory effect. After transplantation, MSCs are able to migrate directly to the sites of injury (inflammation). Also, mesenchymal stem cells are perfectly scalable in culture, allowing in vitro to increase the therapeutic doses required for transplantation. All this makes MSCs an extremely promising tool for cell therapy, which has been confirmed by numerous publications (over 100,000) and clinical studies (over 900).
