The public bank for umbilical cord blood of Euskadi has already been launched. The goal is for hospitals Cruces, Basurto, Donostia and Txagorritxu (wh

The news on other websites Websites in Spanish in other languages Four hospitals Osakidetza collected and processed cord So far, the Department of Health did not allow for the preservation of such cells indiscriminately. Women who gave birth to it could ask the medical team that cared to collect the cord blood and then send it to a private bank on which it could be retained. However, the Bank of umbilical cord blood obtained their stocks of the donation "voluntary, anonymous and altruistic," for recipients who are not relatives. With headquarters in the Basque Center of Human Blood and Tissue located at the hospital in Dunblane, the public bank is in addition to those already operating in Catalonia, Valencia, Andalucia, Madrid, Galicia and the Canary Islands. Counselor for Health, Gabriel Inclán, stressed during the presentation of the center that its reserves will not aimed at self-sufficiency of the donors, but to "participate jointly" in providing units to a global record. The blood will be included in a global base of donors because, among other things, there is no scientific evidence that it serves for itself. Currently, there are stored in Australia about 30,000 CORDS (10% of the units collected worldwide), of which, according to Inclan, only serve less than half as the key "is to collect the cord in a determined way." After obtaining the cells are sent to the Basque Transfusion Center and Human Tissue, which are processed and frozen at -140 degrees without being known with certainty, for the moment, the time period during which they are feasible, although it was estimated that about twenty years. In the world have been conducted about 8000 transplants of bone marrow stem cells through the blood from the umbilical cord with good results. Despite this success, the counselor of Health stressed the complexities involved in the system, including low blood that contains the string. "It takes a minimum of 100 cubic centimeters and, moreover, there is always thinking about the health of mother and child." Eventually, in 100 donations are often useful to 60%. The demand is around four to six patients per million population per year. Since last May, have been incorporated into the maternity services of hospitals in Txagorritxu, Basurto, Donostia, Crossings and specialists Osakidetza responsible for organizing the network of collection and to train and coordinate the staff that will help them.