What is the challenge of bone marrow transplants?
Finding an exact donor match for a bone marrow transplant can take several months, and sometimes a perfect match is never found. One reason cord blood transplants are becoming an attractive alternative to bone marrow transplants is that stem cells from cord blood are frozen and ready to be shipped once identified, so they can be obtained very quickly in situations where patients have rapidly progressive diseases. Additionally, less matching is needed for cord blood than for marrow, so often this provides more options for patients who are difficult to match.
