Melissa Wasserman is used to getting stuck. She is a regular donor of blood but, this trip to Bloodworks Northwest is not intend to save the life of another, but quite possibly her own in the future.Wasserman is one of the first official customers for the Silene Biotech, a pharmaceutical-grade cell preservation service with the relatively simple idea. Their intent is long-term freezing of a customer’s blood, with the hope that scientists will develop cures to what ails us and also the cells could then be thawed and used to heal ourselves.
The work by scientists at the University of Washington to regenerate portions of the human heart is already showing some success.
The customers of Silene Biotech are banking their blood on the hope the stem cells can be used to regenerate portions of their own faulty organs or joints when the technology become available.
The process involves the low-volume blood draw. Silene Biotech then processes the blood then isolates the cells and then freezes them in their Seattle lab. The blood is then sent to a long-term medical storage facility in the Indianapolis, Ind.
The customer retains full ownership of their own cells and can retrieve or destroy the cells at any time. Customers can also opt in to have the cells used anonymously for the scientific purposes.
Jiao said that all personal information is kept confidential with Silene Biotech. There is even a provision in case the company goes out of business.
Wendy Riedy was one of the company’s early beta testers after she saw the KOMO News’s initial story on the Jiao’s idea more than a year ago.
In the future, a person’s own stem cells could be used to reverse the macular degeneration, which runs in the Wendy’s family.
The younger the donor is, the better shape the stem cells could be and likely to be free from pre-cancer factors said Jiao. So, Wendy convinced her daughter to bank her blood just in the case.
The company currently offers the two payment options. There is a $50 annual payment plan with a one-time processing fee of $299. Or there is one-time lifetime payment of $999.
Core blood storage via freezing is not the new concept. It is been done for years for diagnostic reasons and large qualities can be frozen for future surgeries.
But, Jiao believes that their niche will be smaller, affordable blood storage for the future stem cell harvesting.
By Mrudula.
