GE Healthcare and New York Blood Center Announce Milestone in Cord Blood Banking

CHALFONT ST. GILES, England, June 8 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- GE Healthcare (GEHC) and New York Blood Center announced today New York Blood Center's National Cord Blood Program (NCBP) is completing the automation of the key production steps for their cord blood stem cell units by adopting the AutoXpress(TM) System. The AutoXpress automates the harvesting of the stem cell rich mononuclear cell fraction from cord blood into a user determined final volume of approximately 20 ml in a functionally closed sterile system. Since 1999, the NCBP has utilized the BioArchive technology to automate the cryopreservation, storage and retrieval of cord blood units. The AutoXpress and BioArchive technology platform products, developed by ThermoGenesis Corp. are exclusively distributed world wide by GEHC.

According to Pablo Rubinstein, MD, Director of the NCBP, " ... performance data compiled by Ludy Dobrila, Ph.D., NCBP's Associate Director of Processing, and presented on May 5th at the International Society for Cellular Therapy (ISCT) Annual Meeting in Berlin, Germany, showed that the AXP can harvest 97% of the mononuclear cell (MNC) population (which contains the stem cells) from cord blood consistently and efficiently. When these cells are frozen and archived in the BioArchive System, the cell viabilities after thawing exceed 94%."

"Cord blood processing labs must use efficient and reliable methods for processing, cryopreserving, freezing and storing cord blood to maximize recovery and viability of hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells for bone marrow transplantation. These cells are critical for patients who require stem cell reconstitution in the treatment of diseases like acute leukemia, lymphoma and numerous genetic diseases."

NYBC pioneered the use of umbilical cord blood as a source of hematopoietic (blood-forming) stem cells for bone marrow restoration after receiving a three-year research and demonstration Award from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). With the NIH support, Dr. Rubinstein and NYBC established the NCBP as the world's first public cord blood bank. This program requests mothers to donate the blood left in their babies' umbilical cord and placental veins after birth for any patient who might need it. Over 33,000 donations later and more than 2,000 patients transplanted at 150-plus clinical centers around the world, the Blood Center's program has shown that cord blood can be as effective as bone marrow from an unrelated donor. Most importantly, cord blood transplants work well even when not perfectly matched to the patient, a special benefit for patients with rare tissue types including members of ethnic minorities.

According to Nigel Darby, Vice President Research and Development, GEHC, " ... the AXP and BioArchive platform product were designed to improve the quality and consistency of cord blood stem cell units thereby improving the probability of good patient outcomes. The adoption of these technologies by NYBC, which has provided nearly all the pioneering advancements in this exciting new field of cell therapy, is a strong affirmation of the technology."

About New York Blood Center

New York Blood Center is one of the nation's largest independent blood collection and distribution organizations, responsible for providing blood to over 20 million people in the NY-NJ metro area. The Center's Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute is a leader in research on transfusion medicine, conducting both basic and applied research. The National Cord Blood Program at Milstein National Cord Blood Center began operation at NYBC in 1993 with a three-year grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health. Visit NCBP program's website at http://www.nationalcordbloodprogram.org/ or http://www.nybloodcenter.org/.

About GE Healthcare

GE Healthcare provides transformational medical technologies that are shaping a new age of patient care. GE Healthcare's expertise in medical imaging and information technologies, medical diagnostics, patient monitoring and life support systems, disease research, drug discovery, and biopharmaceutical manufacturing technologies is helping physicians detect disease earlier and tailor personalized treatments for their patients. GE Healthcare offers a broad range of products and services that are improving productivity in healthcare and enhancing patient care by enabling healthcare providers to better diagnose and treat cancer, heart disease, neurological diseases, and other conditions.

Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a $15 billion unit of General Electric Company . Worldwide, GE Healthcare employs more than 43,000 people committed to serving healthcare professionals and their patients in more than 100 countries. For more information about GE Healthcare, visit our website at http://www.gehealthcare.com/.

CONTACT: Fern Lazar of Lazar Partners, +1-212-867-1762, for ThermoGenesis Corp.