Hey guys, my wife is 39 weeks pregnant and is scheduled to give birth in the coming weeks. Some have advised me to store my baby's umbilical cord while others have said it is a waste of time and money. Was hoping to get some advice from experienced fathers and mothers on the matter. Is it worth the time and money to store the umblilical cord?
I have 0 knowledge of this subject. But here's a link I found... http://www.dukehealth.org/health_library/advice_from_doctors/your_childs_health/the-value-of-saving-umbilical-cord-blood
likewise...I have 0 knowledge of this subject. Even though I'm an uncle 20 times over, I've never heard of this "umbilical cord" issue. I'm going to error on the side of simplicity. Let the mother (your wife) decide.
Any natural childbirth expert will tell you that the core blood is very useful for newborns, and it is... Except even if you don't want to bank (store) it, most doctors don't care and cut the umbilical cord immediately thus not allowing the baby to benefit from the cord blood anyway. So this depends on how natural a childbirth you want. If natural, then the best choice is to have a very specific birth plan that says you want to WAIT to cut the umbilical cord till its necessary - could be 10 minutes. But you have to let the doctor know and the nurses etc. good luck with that. If you don't care much about that part of the birth then sure banking is a nice insurance policy. But like all insurance it's expensive and really only comes in handy for the rare unlikely emergency. But then if that emergency happens to your kid....
My wife is pregnant, and from the research I've done it's very rare that the baby can even use the cord blood if there is some type of emergency. We're opting not to do it.
Beware if you are anywhere around home plate when the baby is being delivered. There are unspeakable things that your mind will never be able to flush away that occur there. Just a warning. We did not do this (blood banking) with any of my three kids. We did do the additional Down Syndrome testing and such...and I suspect that if any of the tests came up quirky that my wife's OB might've suggested doing so. I suspect that if the pregnancy has been normal and there are no apparent possibly complications then it might be ok to not keep the cord blood. Congrats and good luck. As I've said before, kids are the best toy you can ever have in life. Hug him/her every day. And...I'm also in for the name Jontro!
Unless you're prepared to spend the thousands of dollars that you'll need for the storage and potential use of the cord blood and tissue (Which is still under development) I don't suggest it. This is bleeding edge technology that hasn't been tested of refined. I don't see solid advances made for at least 10-15 years and even when it's ready it will cost thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars to implement.
Stem cell research for all kinds of potential aplications. The theory is that you could store the blood and eventually it could be used for helping heal your child if he ever got sick of lost a limb or developed a severe mental disorder. It's Sci-Fi now but it could be reality in 10 years....for a nominal fee of course.
I will echo Swoly's emoticons here. She is 39 weeks pregnant and due to give birth in the coming weeks? Is 39 a typo? Anyway, good luck to you, your wife and new baby.
