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PETBioNewsNewsChild cancer patients' stem cells lost in freezer failure

BioNews

Child cancer patients' stem cells lost in freezer failure

Published 27 September 2019 posted in News and appears in BioNews 1017

Author

Dr Yvonne Collins

Image by Sílvia Ferreira, Cristina Lopo and Eileen Gentleman via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts a single human stem cell embedded within a porous hydrogel matrix (false colour).
CC BY 4.0
Image by Sílvia Ferreira, Cristina Lopo and Eileen Gentleman via the Wellcome Collection. Depicts a single human stem cell embedded within a porous hydrogel matrix (false-coloured cryogenic scanning electron micrograph).

A children's hospital in the USA has reported a malfunction of a freezer used to store the stem cells of cancer patients...

A children's hospital in the USA has reported the malfunction of a freezer used to store the stem cells of cancer patients.  

The Children's Hospital Los Angeles issued a statement and sent letters to 56 families informing them that their child's blood stem cells were lost due to a freezer malfunction caused by a 'failure of freezer temperature sensors' and 'insufficient' safeguards. 

'We apologise for any distress or confusion that this has caused our patients and their families,' the hospital statement said. It also stressed that the incident would not jeopardise any child's health.

The blood stem cells were collected from the patients before undergoing cancer treatment and stored in the event they might prove useful in the future.

'These blood stem cells, all of which were collected from patients, were in long-term storage. We routinely collect cells early in a child's course of oncology therapy for possible future use. When excess cells are not needed, they remain in storage in the unlikely event that they could become helpful in the future,' the hospital said.

The hospital offered to assist families if they want to harvest stem cells again; however, Sean Anderson Corona, one the children affected by the incidence, described the process as 'painful' and his mother Elizabeth Anderson expressed concern. 

'Once you're through that whole process of doing all the treatment, you've damaged your body,' Anderson told KABC. 'That's how damaging chemo is or the radiation alone. And so it's the same with the stem cells. He doesn't have that as an option to just collect more.' 

Dr James Stein, the hospital's chief medical officer, offered reassurance by saying: 'Were there to be a recurrence of disease that required stem cells, the patients can have their stem cells collected again.'

The faulty freezer has since been replaced and sensor-monitoring and alert system have been upgraded. The hospital also apologised for addressing the letters directly to the patients instead of the parents and said it would support families with any questions and follow-up care.

'Obviously, this is a huge deal for us,' said Dr Stein. 'We're reaching out directly to every single family in person to make sure that all their questions are answered.'

Sources and References

  • 26/09/2019
    CBS News
    Freezer fails at Children's Hospital Los Angeles, destroying stem cells from 56 cancer patients
  • 25/09/2019
    Children's Hospital Los Angeles
    CHLA Apologizes to Patient Families for Freezer Failure
  • 26/09/2019
    CNN
    Cancer patients' stem cells destroyed after freezer fails at Children's Centre Los Angeles
  • 26/09/2019
    Los Angeles Times
    Stem cells of 56 child cancer patients lost at Children’s Hospital after freezer malfunction

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