Cord blood that is also called ‘placental blood’ is the blood that remains in placenta and umbilical cord after birth. The umbilical cord blood is a rich source of stem cells that are genetically unique & hence, extremely useful for the treatment of baby and family members in many complicated diseases that need transplants. Cord blood preservation is done in cord blood bank for future medical treatment needs. Preserving cord blood of a child provides an assurance to deal with critical medical requirements in future with something of immense therapeutic value that would have simply been discarded otherwise. Yes, generally, following age old practice, cord blood was discarded but now in India too awareness about it importance is increasing very fast. More and more would be parents are registering for stem cells preservation as a bio-insurance for their newborn in India too.

Stem cells that are found in cord blood are body's "primary" cells. Stem cells create and control all the organs and tissues in the body. The stem cells of cord blood can be seen as the building blocks of immune system and blood. Stem cells reproduce themselves fast into:

• White Blood Cells – These help to resist infection
• Red Blood Cells - These carry oxygen for the other cells
• Platelets – These ensure blood clotting and safeguard against loss of blood in the course of injury

Stem cells are commonly found in the following three sources:

• Peripheral Blood
• Bone Marrow
• Umbilical Cord Blood

The property of cord blood stem cells to differentiate or get converted into other types of cells makes it much better alternative to bone marrow transplants for the treatment of diseases like stroke, heart disease etc. Stem cell preservation is also used to cure many life-threatening diseases like leukemia, inherited disorders, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and anemia etc. Some diseases generally caused by lifestyle such as liver disorders and diabetes etc can also be cured, thanks to cord blood stem cells preservation.

Cord blood stem cells are preferred by the medical professionals over the stem cells found in bone marrow because of the following reasons:

• Lower risk of severe host disease vs-graft
• More tolerant to tissue mismatches
• Rarely contaminates with latent viruses
• Cord blood stem cells are considered safer in comparison to bone marrow cells.

Child’s birth is once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go in for cord blood stem cells preservation. By preserving your baby's cord blood stem cells, you can provide an extremely reliable support to doctors to deal with life threatening diseases that may affect anyone in the family in the future. As per a recent study, each year approximately 70 percent of the patients fail to find suitable cells match and many of these die due to lack of on-time proper transplant.

Stem cells preservation should be done just not for self interest but also for the social cause because it can save the life of others also, if donated to public cord blood bank.