Posted on 03/03/2016 7:46:16 PM PST by Kaslin
When a child’s tooth falls out, many people adhere to the tradition of the Tooth Fairy. Until recently, a baby tooth was worth nothing more than a couple of bucks tucked under a six-year-old’s pillow. Not so much anymore. Now those very baby teeth can hold the key to a healthy future for your child.
Many parents already opt to bank a baby’s umbilical cord blood, since this blood contains stem cells that can be used to treat dozens of diseases that the child (or a sibling) might develop later in life. While banking cord blood has become popular, it is still relatively expensive. But now, banking baby teeth is a viable option, according to a recent article on TipHero!
Baby teeth contain stem cells inside the dental pulp of the tooth, stem cells that can regenerate into neurons, bone and cartilage, and some cardiac cells that can repair damaged heart tissue. In short, these stem cells can help to cure a myriad of diseases that children are susceptible to.
Where diseases like Hodgkin’s disease, leukemia, and multiple myeloma could once only be treated with painful bone marrow transplants (and similar invasive procedures), recent scientific developments now allow these illnesses to be treated using the child’s own stem cells – like the ones found in their teeth.
Now the Tooth Fairy can give more than just some pocket change. She can give some families a second chance at life:
Luckily, companies like Provia offer an alternate means through tooth storing. Provia bills its service—called “Store-A-Tooth”— for a fairly manageable fee. The catch? The tooth needs to be frozen and stored sooner [sic] 48 hours after it has fallen out, otherwise the cells in the dental pulp will die.
Who would pass up that opportunity?
Can’t find a clue on their website for the HOW MUCH ??
Wisdom teeth, too. I wish my kid had kept his when they were removed before deployment. Actually, he had his teeth in his travel bag but the stem cells were dead. RIP.
Oh, two weeks later he had to go back and have a piece removed that was left behind and was infected.
Seems vaguely like God gave us spare parts.
As if he foresaw we’d develop this tech and wanted us to have an alternative to THAT OTHER THING.
Back Off, Tooth Fairy, Those Baby Teeth May One Day Save a Life
The answer is farther down in the article
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For $649, Provia does what’s called a “whole tissue” preservation. That basically means you ship them your freshly plucked tooth or teeth, the lab extracts the soft tissue inside and immediately puts it in a cryo-protective solution so the tissue can be frozen for future use.
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There are issues with storage costs and total number of cells available for transplant.
Couple of bucks? I only got dimes for mine! Of course you could buy a Coke for a nickel.
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