Cord blood and baby's health seminar/info session (free dinner)?

[jeromedawg]

Hey all,

My wife just got an email invite titled "Learn Ways How Cord Blood Can Protect Your Baby's Health" hosted by Viacord at the local hospital where we are planning to give birth next year. I'm a little apprehensive because it seems like it's going to end up being a sales pitch. But the free dinner and raffle are certainly enticing...

Don't know a ton about the whole cord blood/tissue stem cells topic, but am curious if you think it's worth checking out or if we should just pass.

[I'm a red panda]

It is most certainly a sales pitch.  Private cord blood banks feed off of expecting parents fears. Consider delayed cord clamping, which is recommended by the WHO as something that is beneficial to your baby NOW, or bank the blood in a public bank for any child who may need it. Unless you have a genetic condition that you expect your baby to need cord blood, private banking is expensive and generally unnecessary.

If you routinely go to timeshare pitches for the free cruise or whatever, and are skilled at ignoring the sales pitch, then maybe the free dinner is worth it to you. But otherwise, I'd avoid.

[redbird]

It's only worth going if you absolutely can make yourself ignore the sales pitch, and if hearing the sales pitch won't stress you out.

I don't go to these things, even though I love free food. I know I can ignore the sales pitch. I can be stubborn about not spending money. :) The problem is I hate being advertised at, so that part would stress me out. It wouldn't feel worth it.

[jeromedawg]

The problem is I hate being advertised at, so that part would stress me out. It wouldn't feel worth it.

This 100% - it's not just the sales pitch itself but the follow-up calls and emails that will likely come after the event. If that's pretty much guaranteed, then I think we'll opt out. We had a pregnancy seminar several years ago before having our first and that was nice because it was free dinner but it was more an info session about how things work at that hospital etc - more of a nice thing to do for couples planning to have kids. Wish they had something like that again haha :)

[Guesl982374]

I would pass. Not worth the time when you consider all of the follow up garbage they will send you. When my wife and I ran the numbers there was a 0% chance of helping the child and a very small chance at helping a brother or sister. We considered donating to the public banks but choose to delay clamping.

[jeromedawg]

I would pass. Not worth the time when you consider all of the follow up garbage they will send you. When my wife and I ran the numbers there was a 0% chance of helping the child and a very small chance at helping a brother or sister. We considered donating to the public banks but choose to delay clamping.

Agreed, we'll avoid. When I first saw the forwarded email I was like "cool another one of those free dinner event info sessions about the hospital! let's do it!" but then I went back and re-read the email and saw the parts about "blood cord" and was like mehhhh