I was wondering how common it is. I read all the pamphlets and thought this is awesome! I ended up with a healthy birth and donated a bunch of cord blood. Whenever I talk to my friends IRL nobody has done it and many haven't heard of it. I was just thinking about it since I donated (regular) blood today.
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The first time I did. The second time I requested delayed cord clamping so my DD would get it.
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I've never heard of it before. My hospital does delayed cord clamping as a routine practice, and that was what I planned on anyway.
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I was registered to do it for stem cell research, but as it turned out the required people weren't there to collect it when I delivered, so I donated the whole placenta to some other research instead. They said I could do it even though I had delayed cord clamping, they would just take whatever was left.
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@Bubbles: Yes, I just read similar research re: doing both. It may lessen the amount donated but it is still possible...and wonderful!
I found this comprehensive article just now:
https://mommacommaphd.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/im-donating-my-babys-cord-blood-to-a-public-bank/With some planning a few months in advance, it is so worthwhile ~ 80 diseases are treated with donated cord blood. Another great thing is early detection of genetic/chromosomal abnormalities and infectious disease as testing is performed on the cord blood and parents are notified asap.
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I really wanted to but it's fairly new in Canada, and not all hospitals are in the program. Our city is one of the few where you can donate the cord blood. Unfortunately it wasn't available in our hospital. I knew this when deciding hospitals but the benefits of our hospital outweighed this one negative. I love our hospital and I hope they expand the program before we have LO2 (whenever that is).
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I also requested delayed cord clamping (standard at my hospital). I didn't really look into donating as I thought you couldn't with the delayed clamping. Not even sure if my hospital did it but too late now.
I did get a good look at my placenta this time and cord this time though.
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I'm delaying cord clamping and not going to bank the cord blood ourselves. After the cord finishes pulsing, the doctor/ hospital is welcomed to it.
A mid-wife is picking up my placenta to encapsulate it for me.
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From what I was told, you can't both donate and have delayed cord clamping. We chose delayed cord clamping and will do the same for this LO.
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We were able to delay cord clamping and donate cord blood for all three girls.
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I didn't with LO1 because it wasn't offered at the hospital, but I did just recently with LO2. They delayed cord clamping a bit and were also able to still have blood to donate. The day after delivery, the head of the donation program came to my recovery room and gave us a certificate with LO's name on it thanking him for his donation, which I thought was really cute.
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We didn't do it, because where my son was born and where ended up living could have been two different countries and it is not allowed to ship material over borders. So, we did delayed clamping.
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@808love: I didn't with my first (not available at that hospital). Would like to with this one, if it works out.
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I tried to, but we weren't accepted, I think because my husband is British (he also can't donate blood in Canada, because of Mad Cow disease. Ironically, in England he wouldn't be able to donate blood because of SARS.).
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We prefer to do delayed cord clamping.
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I donated it. It's a pretty common practice at my hospital, I think. The way it worked for us was: received information about it when I pre-registered at hospital; once I was checked in and my induction started, a rep from the cord blood blank came around and asked if I was interested (can't remember if the nurses asked first) and gave me the paperwork to fill out; then they came back once I had delivered. I can't recall if they delayed clamping or not. I actually see the blood bank van on my commute most mornings driving between the hospital where I delivered (near my house) and the one affiliated with the university where I work!
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i did for the first, but not the second. LO2 was three weeks early and i hadn't had a chance to sign the forms. actually, who knows, maybe i did sign it when i went into a labor, but it's kind of a blur because labor was fast and intense and i can't remember.
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Yes we did! DH is an avid blood donir and I thought this would be a very special start go DD's life. I need to write this in her baby book!
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@mrsrain: our hospital allowed us to donate cord blood AND do delayed cord clamping. I was in your same camp before I learned that
ETA: I read through more responses and am surprised how hospitals are so divided on this!
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I would have but my hospital isn't set up to do it. There's going to be a 2-3 year gap now between babies (assuming I get pregnant with #2 soon) so they might be now. I plan on asking about it and doing it if we can.
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I tried but they weren't able to get enough blood to donate. I wish I'd known ahead of time that there is a fairly high level of blood required to make it donate-able and that a lot of people don't make the cut off; had I known that, we would have gone with delayed cord clamping, which is what we did with LO2.
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I was planning to and the rep came by at the hospital to give me the forms. But she never came back! I also ended up with a C-section after my induction failed so I don't know if they even do cord blood donations with C-sections.
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We didn't with DS but now that my BIL has been diagnosed with leukemia and thought for a while that he could benefit from stem cells/cord blood it has made us rethink donating in the future. Delayed clamping isn't really an option for us so it'd be an easy decision to donate.
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I didn't ask for delay cord clamping but I will next time! I believe I did say yes to donating.
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It wasn't offered and I didn't ask so no
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I remember reading all the pamphlets and I thought, "This would be good to do!" But I didn't set anything up in advance, and I kinda forgot. So I voted "I didn't."
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Our hospital wouldn't let you donate on weekends, and my kids have both been weekend babies.
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I wanted to but my hospital wasn't a donation center so i had to apply to have mine taken. I was passed on because I have gd, not sure how that would effect cord blood but whatever. Instead we delayed clamping a bit so lo got most of it.
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I donated mine with the new baby. I was planning a vaginal delivery but wound up with an emergency C-section and I believe they were still able to complete the donation process. No one said otherwise to me anyway. We did not do delayed cord clamping but I believe it would have been an option otherwise.
I had our first at a different hospital and they did not do cord blood donation there.
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We chose delayed cord clamping.
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My OB and the hospital i delivered at gave me alot of cord blood donation info while i was pregnant. I wanted to donate and turned in all the forms before delivery. However, after delivery I was bleeding so much that when the nurse asked the doctor if she was going to collect it she looked at the cord and looked at me and said umm no I have to repair her instead. I thought holy crap I wonder what happened down there. If I have another baby and an easier delivery I hope to donate in the future.
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Wasn't available at our first hospital and then we did delayed cord clamping anyway with both so not possible.
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@pastemoo: That's awesome!
I'm surprised it is offered in a limited number of places. We didn't need to mail in for anything. The hospital handled everything for us. The only thing is I had to answer about 20 minutes worth of questions by phone the day after they collected it.
I am also surprised that a lot of people who responded are doing either/or clamping but the stuff I read sounded like you can do both/and.
Also, thanks to the bee who suggested putting it down in my baby book...I never thought of that.
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We had a home birth, and it wasn't offered. I would not have paid for it ... we also did delayed cord clamping.
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In my city it's only done at one hospital (not the one I delivered at). It's too bad because we were willing and it's my understanding there aren't enough mixed-race donations, which ours would have been.
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I really wanted to, and said so in my birth plan, but it wasn't completely clear to me if it was possible to do that and also do delayed clamping. One resource told me you had to choose one or the other, but I heard something else elsewhere. Turned out I didn't really get to do either since LO was not breathing normally when she came out, so they had to whisk her to the doing-stuff-to-the-baby cart pretty immediately to check her oxygen, and they had to cut the cord for that. (She was totally fine).
[ETA] I'm recalling more clearly now, what my midwife said was that it can depend on how much blood there is, which can vary - sometimes there is enough to donate and also delay clamping.
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It wasn't offered at our hospital. We did delayed clamping with our first, ended up with jaundice, so we did not do it with our second.
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We didn't do delayed clamping or donate. I would have donated if I could have! They didn't ask and I don't remember about it. Maybe they don't do it at my hospital or don't do it on the weekends like another bee mentioned?
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I donated on the weekend (Sunday). It's something that you can usually ask about in your first or second trimester because I think they might need a few months to get paperwork done. Even though the pamphlets were everywhere, I had to ask.
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I wanted to but I've had cancer so I'm ineligible.
Whether you can donate and donate depends on the particular kit, collection process, and rules of the lab. These processes vary quite a bit between hospitals. If you're interested, you should call the rep from the program at your hospital and find out what the requirements are.
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