Beijing Jingdu Children’s Hospital Treats a 7-year-old Boy Through Umbilical Cord Blood Transplant

In recent years, umbilical cord blood transplant has been extensively applied to the treatment of acute leukemia, aplastic anemia, congenital immunodeficiency and inherited metabolic diseases, among others. Statistics show that umbilical cord blood transplant can lower the long-term relapse rate and lessen rejection effects of leukemia patients, and is thus of great significance to the survival of pediatric patients.  

Xiao Ze was born into a happy family. In July 2020, he felt fatigue all of a sudden, with ecchymosis on his skin and suffered a fever. He was rushed to hospital for an examination. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed as having the most severe aplastic anemia. Subsequently, he was admitted to a local hospital for treatment.   

Xiao Ze had a small amount of umbilical cord blood stored when he was born, but the cells are not sufficient. The local hospital treating him did not choose to conduct transplant and instead opted for immunosuppression. But Xiao Ze’s disease was not brought under control and still required blood transfusion. 

Following advice from a hometown fellow who just had their baby treated at Jingdu Children’s Hospital, Xiao Ze’s parents reached out to Sun Yuan, deputy director of the hospital and dean of the Hematology Department, in November 2020. 

Xiao Ze was admitted to Jingdu and transferred to a transplant cabin on the 11th day of his hospitalization. Transfusion and cell transplant went very smooth. Shortly afterwards, Xiao Ze’s granulocytes came back to life and his blood returned to normal. Finally, he got out of the transplant cabin successfully on the 32nd day after admission. 

“We have heard about leukemia before, but have never heard about aplastic anemia. So we didn’t know what to do at all when we first learned the diagnose. Luckily, now that the stem cell transplant has been done for over a month, our child is in good conditions and in good spirit now. The results of blood test are returning to normal, too. We are greatly thankful to deputy director Sun with the department of hematology, Dr. Liu Xiaomei and all the staff.”  

Beijing Jingdu Children’s Hospital is a convener of the national multi-center research coordination group for treating severe aplastic anemia through autologous cord blood transplant. The group has done 15 cases of such transplant so far and all have produced very good results, with the survival rate reaching 100%. 

The hospital has conducted over 100 umbilical cord blood transplants since 2015. Cord blood is playing an increasingly important role in treating children’s diseases. Its effect in treating children’s blood and immunity diseases is gradually recognized by the medical community and patients.