Doctors studying regenerative powers of umbilical cord blood

At Children’s Memorial Hermann, pediatric trauma expert Dr. Charles Cox is studying cord blood to see if it can regenerate damaged brain tissues.

“Cord blood is one piece of that puzzle,” Cox said. “There aren’t any good restorative therapies for brain injury, which is why we got into this years and years ago.”

So far, cord blood can treat 80 different diseases – a convincing statistic to the neo-natal staff.

Dr Cox directs the Pediatric Surgical Translational Laboratories and Pediatric Program in Regenerative Medicine at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston, which address problems that originate with traumatic injury and the consequences of resuscitation and critical care. The Program focuses on progenitor cell based therapy (stem cells) for traumatic brain injury, and related neurological injuries (hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy, stroke, spinal cord injury), recently completing the first acute, autologous cell therapy treatment Phase I study for traumatic brain injury in children. To read more about Dr Cox