South Miami Center for Women & Infants

Company: South Miami Center for Women & Infants, Miami, FL
Company Description: South Miami Hospital opened in 1960 as a 100-bed hospital in what was then a small suburban community. As the area has exploded with new residents, and healthcare with new possibilities, the hospital has kept pace - expanding in size and continually updating its services to meet the community's needs.
Nomination Category: Product & Service Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Best New Service of the Year

Nomination Title: Public Umbilical Cord Blood Collection Center

Describe for the judges the nominated service, including its features and benefits (up to 500 words). Include in this section the date during the eligibility period on which the service was first introduced to the marketplace:

The Public Umbilical Cord Blood Collection Center gives mothers who deliver at
South Miami Hospital the opportunity to donate their babies' umbilical cord
blood. With promising results, physicians can now transplant cells from cord
blood into patients suffering from leukemia, lymphoma, sickle cell anemia, and
other life-threatening genetically¬related diseases of blood and immune system.
As the only public collection center south of Orlando, Florida, South Miami
Hospital's Center makes umbilical cord blood available to patients who need it
worldwide. The Center answers the global shortage of cord blood ¬especially
among minority groups who have fewer potential donors and may have greater
variation in their ancestry.

The beneficiaries of this project are the thousands of adults and children who
will at some time in their lives develop blood or immune related genetic
diseases, cancers and blood disorders. Cord blood transplants are approved by
the majority of the international medical community as treatments for these
devastating and lethal diseases.
The cost to the family donating and storing the cord blood is nil.

The idea for a public umbilical cord blood collection center originated from
South Miami Hospital cardiologist, Harry Aldrich, M.D., whose family faced
difficulties finding a bone marrow donor for his then 8-year¬old son who was
diagnosed with leukemia. Their world-wide search for a donor lead to a match in
Europe. Through this process, Dr. Aldrich learned how cord blood could be used
to save lives.

Umbilical cord blood, which is often discarded as medical waste, can be
transplanted into patients with blood disorders. Unlike bone marrow, donated
cord blood is especially beneficial to ethnic minorities, who often have a
difficult time finding bone marrow matches. Miami's diverse culture provides a
rich source of cord blood for the world.

As a physician and parent, Dr. Aldrich approached Denise Woods, R.N., vice
president of the South Miami Hospital Center for Women & Infants, with his idea
to develop a cord blood collection program for the public domain. Since over
4,000 babies are delivered at South Miami Hospital each year, the appeal of
collecting cord blood to create a worldwide source of cord blood to treat blood
disorders touched a chord with Ms. Woods. Over a period of a year, Ms. Woods,
with the help of Dr. Aldrich, led the campaign to develop a cord blood
collection center at South Miami Hospital for the good of many. Ms. Woods
convinced the obstetrical medical community to donate their time to collect the
cord blood at the time of birth. In spite of setbacks, Ms. Woods' tenacity and
passion for the project would not allow this endeavor to languish.
On January 26, 2009, South Miami Hospital's Center for Women and Infants
collected its first cord blood that was donated to CORD-Use for processing and
storage.

List the URLs (web addresses) of any online news stories, press releases, logos, or other documents that you would like the judges to see that support your entry. IMPORTANT: List each URL on a separate line, begin each URL with http://, and enclose each URL in square brackets. For example, [http://www.yourcompany.com/pressrelease.html]:

Supporting materials for this entry were submitted offline.

Provide a brief biography of the person or persons who lead the team that developed the nominated new service (up to 100 words):

South Miami Hospital's Vice President Denise Woods, R.N., has more than 30 years
of nursing and leadership experience.
She came to South Miami Hospital as the director of surgical services and
quickly added outpatient services, maternity and the Neonatal Intensive Care
Unit (NICU) to her responsibilities. Later, she became assistant vice president,
leading her to develop a center focused on women and babies. She currently is a
vice president for the Center for Women and Infants.

The Center boasts expanded services for maternity and diagnostic imaging, a
maternal-fetal special care unit, a Level '" NICU, a bariatric Center of
Excellence, a robotic surgery program and an umbilical cord blood collection
center.