Cerebral Palsy Now Have a Promising Treatment – Cord Blood Therapy

Cerebral palsy is a condition, which develops because of some damage to the brain at or before the birth. In this brain disorder, muscles in the limbs become stiff and the child is unable to show any kind of movement.

Now, these kids can be cured with the help of their own umbilical cord blood. This cord blood is transfused intravenously into the child’s body and help the child in getting the strength for movement.

A recent research was done in which, 63 children with spastic cerebral palsy were included. These children have variable degree and types of the disorder.

The study results encouraged the researchers to conclude that a fixed dose of cord blood can help in lowering the symptoms of cerebral palsy in the children. Dr. Joanne Kurtzberg, the study author and Director of Pediatric Blood and Marrow Transplant Program, Durham, N.C., said that the results couldn’t be easily explained in all the cases, but some improvements were observed during the study.

The researchers concluded that children, who were administered with intravenous dose of cord blood are capable of generating 25 million stem cells per kilogram and showed some improvement with respect to body movements. The improvement was greater in case of pediatric patients, who were given lower doses.

Kurtzberg also added that there is still some scope of learning regarding the therapy. As the threshold of the dosage is known, there is still the need to know the effect of different doses. A study is required to be done in cases, where the cord cells are not banked, as the research was only made on those children, who had their own cord blood preserved.