Lois Hole Hospital for Women celebrates 10 years as cord blood collection site

A file photo of the Canadian Blood Service's Alberta cord blood bank. (CTV News Edmonton)

Edmonton’s Lois Hole Hospital for Women on Monday celebrated 10 years as a cord blood collection site, having collected nearly 9,000 units over the decade.

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The site at the Royal Alexandra Hospital opened in January 2015 as the fourth and final collection site across Canada.

Cord blood, the stem cell-rich blood that is left in an umbilical cord and placenta, can be used to treat more than 80 diseases and disorders, including leukemia, lymphoma and sickle cell disease. At any given time, as many as 1,000 people across the country may be waiting for a stem cell transplant, according to Canadian Blood Services.

Cord blood was used to treat Tristan Ford’s Griscelli syndrome type 2 when he was diagnosed as a newborn four years ago.

The syndrome prevents the immune system from recognizing a body’s healthy blood cells.

“So when Tristan got a cold, his immune system kicked in to get rid of the cold virus – but then it kept going and attacking his healthy blood cells,” his mom, Manny Ford, told CTV News Edmonton in a virtual interview from their home in Guelph, Ont.

Tristan needed a bone marrow transplant, but no one in the immediate family matched. The next best thing was a stem cell transplant.

“Children with Griscelli syndrome don’t usually survive early infancy, especially without treatment, so it was a really scary time for our family,” Ford recalled.

Four years later, the toddler has some growing to catch up on, but is otherwise going to school like other kids his age.

The family looks back on the ordeal as a “full circle moment” as five years before Tristan’s birth, Ford donated his sister’s cord blood.

“We’re just super grateful that people donate because they never know what will happen to it and it saved my son’s life. He wouldn’t be here today without it,” the mom said.

The cord blood program is provided for free.

It also does not require any change to the labour and delivery process. Once a placenta is delivered, the cord blood’s eligibility is tested and then is banked or used for research. Donors can sign up to participate either online or at the hospital.

Cord blood can be stored for years – longer than a decade, in some cases – without deteriorating in quality.

If it is being donated, it does not need to be an exact match between donor and recipient, unlike stem cell transplants from adult bone marrow, for example.

Upon hearing her daughter’s cord blood had been used four years later, Edmonton donor Kelsey Koch burst into tears.

“I was just overcome with emotion. (It) was just such a deeply profound experience. A very full circle moment for me as a nurse and as a mother,” she told CTV News Edmonton on Monday at an anniversary event hosted by the Lois Hole Hospital for Women.

Since 2015, 889 cord blood donations at the site have been banked with CBS and 27 have been used for transplants. Edmonton has the highest cord blood stem cell transplant rate out of the four locations, according to CBS.

More than 40 per cent of cord blood units selected for transplant are used to treat patients under the age of four because of the low volume of stem cells in cord blood.

“It helps families in need. It goes to research. It is a valuable commodity that has been identified that has no other use once the baby and placenta are delivered. So it seems to me a win-win on all fronts,” said Royal Alexandra Hospital obstetrician/gynecologist Dr. Juliette Sacks.

CBS on Monday also announced it was moving its cord blood collection facility within Lois Hole to the labour and delivery ward, which a spokesperson said would ease the workflow and partnership between departments.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Kerry McAthey and Evan Klippenstein