Patient population and sample collection
Ethical approval for the study was received from the institutional
ethics committee at the National Maternity Hospital, Holles Street,
Dublin, Ireland. Informed written consent for blood sampling was
obtained in all cases and completed by a single investigator. The study
population included the following groups:
Adult controls: 10 healthy women and 10 men aged 20-33 years.
Peripheral venous blood (9 mL) was obtained by phlebotomy and collected
in EDTA-coated vacutainers. UCB samples: 9 mL umbilical cord
blood samples (n=10 males, n=10 females) collected in EDTA-coated
vacutainers immediately following elective (no labour) Caesarean Section
(CS) delivery from uncomplicated term (≥37+ 0 weeks) pregnancies.
All elective CS were performed under spinal anaesthesia. All neonates
had an uncomplicated postnatal course. Samples were kept on ice and
processed within 90 minutes.