ONONDAGA — The State University of New York Upstate Medical University is preparing to deal in blood — umbilical-cord blood. Upstate broke ground Sept. 17 on a $15 million construction project that will build a public umbilical-cord blood bank at its Community Campus in the town of Onondaga. The facility will be known as the […]
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ONONDAGA — The State University of New York Upstate Medical University is preparing to deal in blood — umbilical-cord blood.
Upstate broke ground Sept. 17 on a $15 million construction project that will build a public umbilical-cord blood bank at its Community Campus in the town of Onondaga. The facility will be known as the Upstate Cord Blood Bank.
It will join the National Cord Blood Program in Long Island City to become one of only two public cord-blood banks in the state. The facility will be one of just 27 such banks in the nation, according to Upstate Medical University.
The cord-blood bank is set for space at 4900 Broad Road in the town of Onondaga — the former Community General Hospital site, which is now known as Upstate University Hospital’s Community Campus. Upstate hopes to have the blood bank open by the third quarter of 2014.
Umbilical-cord blood contains hematopoietic stem cells that can be used to treat certain cancers, metabolic disorders, and immunodeficiency diseases like sickle-cell anemia. It can be drawn from an umbilical cord and placenta after a baby has been delivered and the cord cut and clamped. The blood can then be preserved at extremely low temperatures for later use.
Medical institutions typically discard the blood as waste, according to Upstate Medical University President Dr. David Smith, who spoke at the blood bank’s groundbreaking ceremony. That won’t be the case if a family donates umbilical-cord blood to the medical university’s blood bank, he said.
“Nothing is wasted,” Smith said. “We’re going to be able to save that, utilize that. Not only for patients, but when it’s not being used for patients, we can use it for research.”
Not all umbilical-cord blood is suitable for treating patients, according to Thomas Quinn, Upstate’s senior vice president for health system development. The Upstate Cord Blood Bank will designate blood that is not qualified for patient use for research, he says.
The center will try to draw blood from hospitals across upstate New York, but it will be able to send it to compatible patients at transplant centers throughout the world. It will list its umbilical-cord blood units on the Be The Match registry operated by the Minneapolis–based National Marrow Donor Program.
Upstate Medical University hopes its umbilical-cord blood bank will eventually take donations from 10,000 births a year. It does not yet know exactly how many units of blood it will store at the facility at one time, Quinn says.
Construction
The blood bank will span two stories and contain between 10,000 square feet and 15,000 square feet of space, depending on its final design, he continues. Francis Cauffman of New York City is the project’s architect. Rochester–based The Pike Co. will be its construction manager, and Kansas City, Mo.–based CRB is filling the role of engineer. About 150 construction workers will help build the facility.
Surveying and other work to prepare the site will run through the end of this year. Construction is slated to start around the beginning of next year.
Upstate Medical University plans to hire 10 new employees to staff the facility when it opens, Quinn says. It could later grow to 15 or 20 employees, he adds.
The project has been in planning stages for about six years, according to Quinn. Funding comes from grant money built into the New York State Budget and SUNY funding, he says.
The building’s $15 million price tag includes design fees and the cost of equipment it will hold.
Upstate Medical University must work with hospital leaders and obstetrics and gynecology physicians to start donation programs, Quinn says. It has to reach out to mothers so they will agree to donate umbilical-cord blood, he adds.
“I think right now the most important thing to do is to get the word out to families that this is coming,” Quinn says. “A lot of people know about private cord banking, which does not have the same utility as public cord banking.”
As a public umbilical-cord blood bank, the center will not charge fees for donating cord blood. That’s a different model than private umbilical-cord blood banks, which are for-profit organizations charging fees for storing cord blood. Private banks also reserve blood for use of the family making the donation, according to Upstate Medical University.
“There’s odds of 1 in 2,600 that one’s own cord blood will be used in one’s child,” Quinn says. “It’s much greater that it can be used for the public good.”
Contact Seltzer at rseltzer@cnybj.com
