Lifebank USA

By Cord Blood Advisor on June 28th, 2007

LifebankUSA (A Celgene Company)

PHONE: 877-LIFEBANK

OFFICE: Cedar Knolls, NJ

STORAGE: Cedar Knolls, NJ

Accreditation: AABB, MD, NJ, NY

COMMENT: LifebankUSA and its parent company, Celgene Corporation (Nasdaq: CELG) offer both family and public Cord Blood banking. They are currently (June 2007) the only company which offers the option to bank placental Stem Cells for family use. Through their public donation program, Celgene provides Cord Blood for clinical trials and pharmaceutical products.

Cord Blood BANKING SERVICES:

List of LifebankUSA transplants
Testimonials from LifebankUSA transplants
Educational film about cord blood banking in general
Animation of collection procedure
Live customer support available 24/7; parents or physician can phone during delivery.
LIfebankUSA recommends cord blood collection while the placenta is in utero.
The LifebankUSA collection kit provides a ChloraPrep® One-Step Frepp® Applicator to clean the umbilical cord prior to collecting the cord blood.
Cost includes domestic courier transport via Quick International.
LifebankUSA has validated their cord blood laboratory procedures as yielding 99% removal of red blood cells.
Client referral program gives $300 discount to the new client and awards a year of free storage to the existing client.
Returning clients receive $400 off enrollment. LifebankUSA also has a Gift Registry.
Payment plans start at $44/month for 52 months. A twelve month interest free payment plan is also available.
Charity Program: “Families in Need” with a disease treatable by a Stem Cell transplant may be entitled to free enrollment.

PLACENTA BANKING SERVICES:

Starting April 24, 2006, LifebankUSA is the first cord blood bank in the world to offer private banking of placental blood, for an additional cost. Research on the placenta shows it is a rich source of Stem Cells, similar to those in cord blood.
Celgene research shows that the placenta is ten times richer in Stem Cells than cord blood, based on counts with the CD34+ stain. Independent preclinical research has shown that a higher dose of CD34+ Stem Cells ensures a better transplant outcome.
The optional banking of placental blood is completely separate from cord blood collection:
First the cord blood is collected while the placenta is in utero.
When the placenta is delivered, the entire placenta is sent to LifebankUSA. It is processed in a separate clean room and the cells which are extracted are stored separately.
Because the placenta storage is separate from the cord blood, any risks of contamination are separate, and they can be used separately.

ADDITIONAL information: The private cord blood bank LifebankUSA is operated (Aug 2007) by the same core staff who founded the bank in 1998, despite their acquisition by the public company Celgene in 2002. These core staff also formed a biotech company named Anthrogenesis, which founded another stem cell laboratory in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Anthrogenesis operated a program called “The Louisiana Stem Cell Repository” (www.la-stemcell.com; website no longer active), which collected placentas donated by parents at local charity hospitals (see archived reports from 11/13/02 and 11/15/02 in The Advocate). On 13 Nov 2002, Celgene (Nasdaq: CELG) acquired both Anthrogenesis and LifebankUSA for $45 million. The current (2007) disclosed market value of Celgene is more than $20 billion, and almost 40% of their revenues are invested in research and development. The family cord blood banking program still operates under the name LifebankUSA, at their NJ laboratory which is accredited by both AABB and ISO 9001:2000. The LA laboratory is dedicated to research sponsored by Celgene Cellular Therapeutics. Since 2005, Celgene has provided donated stem cells for research on therapies for cancer, heart disease, neurodegenerative disorders such as ALS, spinal cord injury, and other diseases. Their research partners include:

The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
The Mayo Clinic
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Texas Heart® Institute

Celgene also uses the membrane of donated placentas to develop proprietary medical products. One such product is “Biovance”, a collagen-based wound covering. Biovance is primarily composed of amniotic membrane that has undergone minimum processing. Another Celgene product is “Ambiodry”, a dehydrated, decellularized, substrate-free human amniotic membrane allograft. Each allograft has been sterilized and a packaged in a double peel-pouch packaging configuration. LifebankUSA is one of only two banks in the country which accept mail-in cord blood donations from across the country. However, their ability to accept these donations fluctuates depending on the cycles of research trials.