The collection of the cord blood is performed by the obstetrician immediately after ligation and cut of the umbilical cord. The right collection of blood is very important for the process and storage of stem cells. The procedure of the blood collection is simple, lasts about 5 minutes and is safe for the child and the mother, given to the fact that is performed after birth. The parents must have been supplied with Biohellenika’s collection kit on time, that they must keep in perfect condition until they deliver it to the birth room and give to their obstetrician. The blood that has remained in the placenta after birth is collected in a specially sterilized bag of the kit and is delivered to Biohellenika’s labs, where the isolation, quality controls and the cryopreservation of the stem cells are performed. The greatest amount of cord blood is absolute necessary to be collected. In case of a twin pregnancy the volume that is collected from each child is smaller, without causing any problem to their further use. All facts until today show that the age and the nationality of the mother, the weight that the mother gained during pregnancy and the gender of the child play no role in the successful collection of the umbilical cord blood. The only factor that seems to lead to the collection of greater volume is the weight of the child at birth and the completion of the pregnancy time. The greater the volume of the blood collected, the greater the final number of the cryopreserved stem cells.

Wharton’s jelly is the embryonic connective tissue that surrounds the blood vessels of the umbilical cord and is the only remnant of embryonic tissue in the newborn. This type of tissue contain mesenchymal stem cells that can not be collected with the classical method nor with the drainage of the placenta. These stem cells are collected  from a part of the umbilical cord about 15cm of length, that is cut from the obstetrician and comes to the laboratory in a special sterile package. The cells are separated through enzymatic digestion, cryopreserved and stored in two cryovials for the next 20 years.

Today the stem cells from this source have been differentiated in neural cells, osteocytes, chondrocytes, adipocytes, cardiomyocytes and skeletal myocytes and for this reason the cells are expected to be used in regenerative medicine. Their most important use however is the regulation effect on the immune system that leads to the reduction of allogeneic hematopoietic transplants (not fully matched) rejection for the leukemia and malignancies treatment. Their simultaneous administration with not fully matched haematopoietic transplants increase the percentage of hematopoietic cells implantation and decrease their rejection.

This type of cells is for autologous use today. In Biohellenika we use enzymatic digestion methods to isolate and cryopreserve stem cells and never cryopreserve whole segments of umbilical cord. Following our method we are able any time to use these type of cells for the patients, instead to wait to defrost the segments and isolate the cells at the time that the patient is needed. Also the method of the whole tissue cryopreservation is not secure for the future stem cells isolation after post-thaw.

By using all these three sources during the birth, we complete all the possible ways to harvest stem cells. We assure to give the opportunity to use stem cells for hematological diseases and applications of regenerative medicine therapies to all patients, even those with a big body mass, that under different conditions would not have a sufficient number of stem cells for treatment.