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Drive For Life Offers Bone Marrow Registry Testing

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Oct 2, 2008 5:28 pm US/Mountain

Drive For Life Offers Bone Marrow Registry Testing

Written by CBS4 special projects producer Libby Smith
Reporting
Dr. Dave Hnida
DENVER (CBS4) ― Bonfils Blood Center is offering free registration for the National Marrow Donor Registry during Drive for Life XI.  All it takes is completing a health history and consent form and then submitting a sample of DNA from a cheek swab.

The registry is a list of eligible bone marrow donors who've agreed to donate if it will help a patient suffering from blood related disease, like lymphoma and leukemia.

"When you get to the place where you need a marrow donation, it's pretty severe. Often times it is your last chance at survival so those folks who go onto the registry are saying they would be willing and able to give a marrow donation to those folks if they make a match," said Jessica Maitland, VP of Marketing and Community Operations for Bonfils Blood Center.

That is exactly the situation that Andrea Swanson is in right now. Swanson is battling Hodgkins lymphoma for the third time in two years.

"It's frustrating," Swanson tells CBS4.

She was diagnosed in April of 2006. She went through 6 cycles of chemotherapy and 20 days of radiation, and it looked like she had beaten the disease. But then 7 months later the cancer was back. This last January she went through a stem cell transplant using her own cells, again she was sure the treatment would work.

"I really had hope. I mean I never thought that it was going to come back after the transplant for sure, so this time has been really, really hard," Swanson said.

In June, the cancer was back again. Now Swanson is starting a new round of chemotherapy and radiation and she's waiting and hoping that someone will sign up on the National Bone Marrow Registry that is her perfect match.

"Just hope I guess, hope to find the perfect match, that person who's actually gonna cure me, hopefully," she added.

Swanson is of Colombian decent. Doctors tell her she'll have a better chance of making a match with someone of Latino decent, but the pool of people signed up on the registry is pretty small. Friends and family have held registration drives, but still she needs more minorities to sign up to save her life.

Potential bone marrow donors must be in general good health and between the ages of 18 and 60. Last year 140 people joined the registry during Drive for Life. This opportunity will be offered again this year at Drive for Life.

Additional Resources:

Join CBS4, Bonfils Blood Center and the Denver Broncos at Drive for Life XI on Tuesday, Oct. 7 from 7 a.m. - 7 p.m. on the club level of Invesco Field at Mile High. Click here for more information.

(© MMIX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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