Cerebral Palsy

This is a condition where the brain is unable to control the muscles of the body, impacts as many as 10,000 newborns each each, accoording to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). 

When Chloe Levine was 9-months-old, her parents noticed she could not hold her bottle with her right hand. That was not her only developmental setback. Chloe, of Pinetop, Arizona, was unable to raise both hands above her head and could not crawl. At 12 months, a CAT scan showed a portion of the left side of Chloe's brain had not developed and contained fluid. Chloe's parents, Ryan and Jenny Levine, took her to a neurologist who diagnosed the toddler with right-side hemiplegic cerebral palsy. "The cerebral palsy had only affected the right side of her body," Jenny Levine said. "The neurologist told us we were looking at 17-18 years of therapy." That was when the Levines heard about an experimental procedure at Duke University in North Carolina, where children with cerebral palsy were infused with their own cord blood stem cells in an effort to heal and repair damaged brain tissue.

The Levines remembered they had banked Chole's cord blood when she was born. "It was a miracle," Dr. Manny Alvarez said on FOX & Friends. "I congratulate you for banking her cord blood. Stem cells are a new field of medicine and they certainly can rejuvenate the tissue." Two months ago, Chloe, 2, received an infusion of her own stem cells and her progress is remarkable, said her father, Ryan. "Her therapist said she's made a 50 percent recovery," he said. "She can walk, run, and do sign language with her right hand." [1]

[1] "Cord Blood Stem Cells Reverse Girl's Cerebral Palsy," Fox News (July 28, 2008). Accessed at: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,392061,00.html