Cord Blood Banking Options

Which is right for your family: Private cord blood banking or public donation?

Research continues to advance new discoveries on the effectiveness of cord blood and cord tissue stem cells in treating many life-threatening diseases. The use of stem cells derived from cord blood is already routinely being used in the treatment of more than 80 diseases, including leukemia, lymphoma, and many other blood disorders, cancers, immune disorders and metabolic disorders.^1,6

As an expecting parent, you have many things to decide. One of the crucial decisions to make will be choosing what you do with the valuable stem cells found in your baby’s umbilical cord after your child’s birth.

You have three options with this precious resource:

1. Privately bank your baby’s cord blood.
2. Donate to a public cord blood bank (only available in 3% of hospitals in the United States).²
3. Have the hospital discard these otherwise life-saving cells post-delivery.

If you’ve decided you’d rather not have these life-saving cells discarded, read further to determine which banking option is right for you.

Public Cord Blood Donation

Public cord blood banks store unrelated cord blood units that are donated. The relevant information (e.g., HLA types, cell counts, and the birth mother's medical history) is then stored in a database and sometimes made available to research facilities and transplant centers.

Important facts related to public cord blood donation:

• Public cord blood banks have the option to sell your baby's cord blood or discard it.
• 80% of all publicly donated cord blood samples are not stored for future transplantation.⁴
• Only 3% of hospitals in the U.S. can accept cord blood donation to a public cord blood bank.²
• If your baby's cord blood was donated to a public bank, there is a high probability it will not be available to you when needed, leaving your family to hope and wait for a donor match, which may never be found.
• If a donor match can be located, transplant centers typically charge approximately $50,000 for each cord blood unit that is retrieved from a public bank.⁵ This cost may or may not be covered by insurance, or may be subject to an insurance deductible that exceeds the cost of lifetime plan in a private cord blood bank.
• Public banks do not accept cord tissue.

1. Parent's Guide to Cord Blood Foundation. Retrieved February 10, 2025. Diseases that can be Treated with Cord Blood. https://parentsguidecordblood.org/en/diseases
2. National Library of Medicine: National Center for Biotechnology Information. Retrieved February 10, 2025. US Public Cord Blood Banking Practices: Recruitment, Donation, and the Timing of Consent. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3477280/
3. Release of cord blood and cord tissue stem cells is subject to FDA guidelines.
4. Parent's Guide to Cord Blood Foundation. (n.d.). Retrieved May 31, 2016. Cord Blood Introduction: Cord Blood Infographic: http://parentsguidecordblood.org/en/cord-blood-infographic
5. National Marrow Donor Program. (n.d.). Retrieved January 11, 2010. University of Chicago: http://www.marrow.org/PATIENT/Plan_for_Tx/Choosing_a_TC/US_NMDP_Transplant_Centers/Detailed_Center_ Information/tc_idx.pl?ctr_id=557
6. Of the 80+ FDA-approved therapies using cord blood stem cells, approximately 87% of those therapies are for alogeneic transplants that use the child's stem cells to treat immediate family members of the child, such as siblings, parents, and grand-parents.(1) The remaining 13% of those FDA-approved therapies are for autologous transplants that use the cord blood to treat the child that the stem cells came from.(1) There are more than 150 clinical trials that have been initiated exploring new autologous therapies for conditions such as autism and cerebral palsy.(9)
7. ClinicalTrials.gov. Retrieved February 10, 2025. https://clinicaltrials.gov/search?term=cord%20blood
8. ClinicalTrials.gov. Retrieved February 10, 2025. https://clinicaltrials.gov/search?term=cord%20tissue
9. ClinicalTrials.gov. Retrieved February 10, 2025. https://clinicaltrials.gov/expert-search?term=autologous%20AND%20cord%20blood&viewType=Table&page=1&limit=100