Analysis of Factors in Choice of Cord Blood Units

                                 for Transplantation

                   Fiona Zhang, April Goodear, Marcus Vowels, Mel Chimenti

                                             Sydney Cord Blood Bank

Introduction

There were 7605 Cord Blood Units collected and made available for transplant at the Sydney Cord Blood Bank between June 1995 and September 2004. During this time 85 Units have been released to transplant centres.

Aim

To investigate if there are any trends in the cellular contents of the released cord blood units, and to overview the main cellular features of these 85 Cord Blood Units, including cell count, CD 34 count, volume, and yield. Also to identify the ethnic background of the cord blood being taken and regions where transplant centres were located.  

Method

All tests were performed at the time of Cord Blood processing and the results were evaluated from the cord blood production database.  The data of transplanted units were compared with the data of all cord blood units available for transplant.

Result

Table 1: Comparison of Post TNCC for Transplanted and All Stored CBUs 

    Table 2: Ethnic Group of Transplanted Cord Blood Units

Conclusion

From our results, although 45% of all collected units had post TNCC < 9 x 10^8, 78% of transplanted units had post TNCC > 9 x 10^8.  Half of the units taken for transplant were from the group containing 35% of the largest volumes and CD34 counts.  80% of transplanted units had processing Yields within the average range for the laboratory.

Over 40% of transplanted units were from non-Anglo-Saxon background.  This indicates the wide range of ethnic groups we are storing at the Cord Blood Bank, and the significant amount we are sending to overseas ethnic groups.

Cord Blood Units containing high cell counts, high CD 34 counts and those with large collection volumes are more likely be chosen for transplantation.