Hand It over to a Bank. Period

Chucking that sanitary napkin pack could be an investment for the future. The country’s first private cord blood bank is here.

Chucking that sanitary napkin pack could be an investment for the future. LifeCell International, the country’s first private cord blood bank, has just launched LifeCell Femme menstrual pod, a flexible conical silicon cup which can collect menstrual blood in place of the average sanitary napkin. It’s cheaper, more hygenic, reusable, plus the collected blood can be used for tissue culture and tissue regeneration therapy. “Menstrual blood has the only tissue that regenerates every month,” says Mayur Abhaya of LifeCell. “It has 100,000 times more growth factor than any other tissue, and can be used to regenerate heart tissue after a stroke, to treat osteoporosis, treat arthritis etcetera.” If the American Food and Drug Administration approves the therapy by 2011, LifeCell believes tissue regeneration therapy will catch on, even in India. Women who sign up with LifeCell have to use the pod to collect blood, and dispatch it to LifeCell’s Chennai head office using the company’s collection kit. There, the blood can be stored for up to 20 years or more. Abhaya says this option is especially attractive to women who’re approaching menopause and looking at the end of their egg cycle. It’s not an expensive investment: LifeCell charges Rs 24,000 for collection and one year of storage, and Rs 2,000 annually thereon.

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Manju Sara Rajan