Services store stem cells from baby teeth; critics say it’s not worth cost

Your child's baby teeth could some day help provide a medical cure worth far more than what the tooth fairy pays.

Three companies - BioEDEN of Austin, Texas; Provia Laboratories in Lexington, Mass.; and StemSave of Scottsdale, Ariz. - are offering to store stem cells taken from baby teeth in liquid nitrogen, at minus 197 degrees Celsius, for potential future treatment of diseases.

Stem cells are the master cells of the body that regenerate many cells, tissues and organs. Researchers around the world are conducting clinical trials of stem-cell therapy to treat a variety of diseases.

Songtao Shi, a researcher at the University of Southern California, discovered stem cells in baby teeth in 2003 after his 6-year-old daughter lost a tooth. Shi determined that the core of a baby tooth, which contains blood vessels, nerve endings and fatty tissue, is a rich source of four types of stem cells - mesenchymal, chondrocytes, osteoblasts and adipocytes.

Michael Byrom, chief scientific officer at BioEDEN, said mesenchymal stem cells are important, because they potentially have multiple applications.

“Mesenchymal stem cells were identified in bone marrow 25 or 30 years ago,” Byrom said during an interview last month in Cedar Rapids. “There are a lot of late-phase clinical trials of mesenchymals from bone marrow to combat human disease. Clinical trials have shown that mesenchymals from teeth can do everything that those from bone marrow can do.”

Despite promising research, storing stem cells from baby teeth has its critics. They contend the steep upfront cost - about $600 - and a storage fee of $100 annually are not justified, given the remote chance that the stem cells may be needed later in life.

Sean Morrison, associate professor of cell and developmental biology at the University of Michigan Medical Center in Ann Arbor, said some companies are fraudulently claiming that stem cells from baby teeth can be used to cure diseases like Parkinson's and juvenile diabetes.

“This industry is kind of patterning itself after the industry that freezes cord blood,” Morrison said. “On the one hand, cord blood contains stem cells that are used clinically to do things like regenerate the blood-forming system of children after they've been treated for leukemia. On the other hand, the chances that your child is going to need their stem cells later are really remote.”

Byrom, who presented an April 21 seminar for area dental health professionals, said stem cells harvested from baby teeth and cord blood “contain entirely different stem cells for completely different therapeutic applications.”

Byrom said a child's anterior teeth - the front six top and bottom teeth - are preferred because, “by the time the posterior teeth come out naturally, there is very little material left to collect.”

Parents who use the service immerse a tooth in milk as soon as it falls out, Byrom said, and ship it overnight to BioEDEN.

“We have about 48 hours to successfully harvest the stem cells,” he said.

If the stem cells are viable, they are divided into two samples and stored in separate facilities.

“If the stem cells are not viable when they are needed at some future date, we will refund the registration fee and all the annual storage fees,” Byrom said.