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Years from now, regenerative medicine may make it possible for patients to grow their own cartilage, skin, or heart valves. Advances in stem cell research will help create cures for cancer and diseases such as multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's.

A new state law establishing a network of umbilical cord blood banks for medical treatment and stem cell research is bringing that day closer to reality.
"A lot of people, they hear stem cells, and they're just kind of half-and-half, not sure how to feel," said state Rep. Jon Woods, R-Springdale, author of the new law. "But once you start talking about blood banks, they get comfortable and everybody's for it."

For proof of that one need look no further than the reception Woods' bill received in the state legislature. Eight months ago, President George W. Bush vetoed a bill that could have increased funding for embryonic stem cell research.

Woods' bill flew through the state House of Representatives and Senate with little or no opposition. Gov. Mike Beebe agreed to sign it before the bill even made it to the Senate floor.

Woods has a personal interest in stem cell research. His father has multiple sclerosis. His grandfather died from cancer. The 29-year-old legislator has seen childhood heroes Michael J. Fox, star of "Back to the Future," and Christopher Reeve, "Superman," push for embryonic stem cell research funding.

Those events, Woods said, put his own mortality in perspective.

After the president vetoed the embryonic stem cell research bill, Woods cast about for a noncontroversial approach. He noticed that Georgia had passed the same kind of legislation so Woods modified the Georgia law for Arkansas.

Under the bill, Arkansas will set up an 11-person commission to oversee the cord blood storage network. Three of the members will be appointed by the governor, three by the House and three by the Senate. The commission is set up so that three members will be physicians, three will have financial backgrounds and two will be members of the state Department of Health. The commission will also have a nonvoting consultant, the director of cell therapy and transfusion medicine of the College of Medicine of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS).

Stem cell research has already spawned treatments for anemia, leukemia, lymphoma, lupus, multiple sclerosis and a host of other ailments, Woods said. The nearest cord blood bank is in St. Louis, and stem cells from that bank saved 550 lives last year.

The cost to finance the Arkansas network operation through 2009 is estimated at around $500,000, Woods said. The total includes the money needed for marketing and travel, setting up seminars to educate women about the good of donating their babies' umbilical cords.

A freezer capable of storing several hundred cords and their blood would cost from $35,000 to $40,000, Woods said, and the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences has volunteered to serve as the main storage site.

Woods is hoping the cord blood bank will help boost Arkansas's stem cell treatments and research.

Arkansas is already a leader in certain areas of stem cell research, he said.
For example, Woods said the UAMS and a Houston center perform the most autologous stem cell transplants, a procedure where stem cells are harvested from a patient and given back to him or her, in the United States.

Dr. Michelle Fox would serve as the nonvoting consultant to the cord blood bank commission.

Once the bank is up and running, Arkansas will be able to participate in national and international networks of cord blood banks, Fox said. These banks supply stem cells for transplant all over the world for children and adults with cancer.

Fox said the law contains another important provision, establishing the principle that some of the cord blood should be used for research.

"I get calls every week from all over the state from people who want to donate their cords for research or to a public bank, and they ask me how can they do it," Fox said. "Right now I have no way to do it, so nothing happens."

The reason is that the state doesn't have a cord blood bank, Fox said.

Right now, the only people who can bank cord blood are the ones with enough
money to pay for storage for themselves, Fox said. The people who are storing cord blood for personal or family use are not doing it because they need the stem cells but because it might be good for something later on.

"But the public use of cords for transplantation for cancer is huge and growing daily, and right now nobody in Arkansas can save that cord blood for another person to use," Fox said.

The cord blood bank in St. Louis describes donating one's children's cord blood for someone else as "The First Gift," Fox said.

"I think it's a wonderful term, but that First Gift is going wasted all over Arkansas today," she said.


May 2007

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