Cape Town - Bone marrow donation is not the harrowing, painful experience I imagined it to be. It does not involve drilling into the bone and sucking out the marrow.
Sunflower Fund founder Tina Botha says it is a misconception that is held by many.
All it involves is that those who meet the criteria, and have been well informed of the entire process, will have a blood sample taken that is sent for tissue typing analysis and then they are placed on the national database.
Botha says donors are needed across the board, but more so when it comes to black, coloured and Asian people. This is because a match of donor and recipient is heavily reliant on DNA markers and ethnic heritage. Of those on the register, only 17 percent are African, Asian or mixed ethnic donors.
The national registers are accessible by various countries and Botha emphasises that with the black population being the majority in SA and Africa, there is a big need to increase their representation on the register.
“The register is a state asset. It is critically important to each one of us. We have to think about it now, don’t wait until it’s your brother, sister or child. Do something now,” says Botha.
Last month, Botha was named Shoprite Checkers Woman of the Year in the health caregivers category for the work the fund has done in helping to grow the national registry, which is nearly at 65 000.
Her son, Chris Corlett, was diagnosed with leukaemia in 1997, at the age of 14. At the time, there were fewer than 1 000 donors on the local registry. After three bone marrow transplants from unrelated donors, Chris died at the age of 17.
According to his sister, Tarryn Corlett-Boden, Chris, an avid artist, believed donors gave patients hope and he painted a picture of sunflowers which he named, Sunflowers of Hope.
His painting became the symbol of The Sunflower Fund.
The annual Sunflower campaign will end on National Bandana Day on October 12 – Chris’s birthday
Bandanas are available in all Pick n Pay stores across the country and from local Round Tables until the end of the campaign.
For more information on becoming a donor, see www.sunflowerfund.org.za or call the toll-free hotline at 0800 12 10 82.
Had a transplant
Ra-ees Khan, 14, was a toddler when he was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL). The cancer is common in younger children, and deemed treatable.
Ra-ees was 12 years old when he received a cord blood stem cell transplant, but it’s been a long journey to recovery.
His mother, Sumaya Khan, says Ra-ees was only three years old when he first became ill and underwent chemotherapy. He responded well and was in remission for three-and-a-half years.
In November 2005, when Ra-ees was at the end of his Grade 1 year, he relapsed.
This time around, he had to undergo an aggressive form of therapy which lasted nearly two years.
“It was tough to see him go through the ups and downs. He lost his hair, it affected his skin and eyes. But I told myself we just had to take it one day at a time,” says Khan.
Ra-ees came off the treatment in 2008. Just over a year later, he had another relapse. “This time things were different. He couldn’t get treatment any more aggressive than the last. The only alternative was to find a [bone marrow] match,” says Khan.
His parents and younger brother were tested, but no matches were found within his family.
Khan did research and contacted the South African Bone Marrow Registry and The Sunflower Fund.
This is when Khan found out the extent of the need for donors from the Asian, coloured and black ethnic groups. There was not a single match for Ra-ees in the country.
Khan called the registry weekly. Meanwhile, Ra-ees was back on chemotherapy, as he had to be in remission if a donor was found.
A match was eventually found in the US, but the family had to raise more than R300 000 to transport the stem cells to SA. Their community and family, and even strangers stepped forward to help.
Khan says a woman who had read about his story came to their house and dropped off R15 000. They had never met before.
“That year was all a blur,” says Ra-ees. He remembers that he was unable to attend a concert organised by his family, because the risk of him contracting an illness was too great. His mother says during that period he became very withdrawn.
After his 12th birthday, Ra-ees had his lifesaving transplant on April 20, 2010.
“It was very hard, but we took it one day at a time and we got through it. He’s come a long way. He’s matured a lot quicker than others. He was forced to deal with the reality of mortality and how to cope with it. He’s much happier and we live each day in the hope that we can just move forward,” says Khan.
She and Ra-ees are appealing to people to educate themselves about becoming donors.
“I’ve been doing this my whole life,” says Ra-ees. “It’s just a prick and drawing some blood. Needles are not a big deal. It’s over in 10 seconds. And if you match, you could be saving somebody’s life.”
Facts and figures
* The chances of finding a matched donor are 1:100 000.
* The odds are even more against South Africans; because of mixed heritage there are more unique combinations of tissue types.
* Chances of finding a match with siblings are 1:4.
* The medical procedure for obtaining stem cells from the blood is called a harvest.
* If you are a match, growth factor injections will be administered, increasing the production of stem cells in the bone marrow. The excess stem cells enter the bloodstream from where they are harvested, using a cell separator machine. The donor is connected to a machine by an intravenous line, similar to blood donation. The stem cells are filtered out of your blood, and then your own blood is returned to you, the donor.
Celebs willing to give of themselves
Former Springbok Kobus Wiese initiated the Avoid the Pain campaign at the beginning of August and challenged four celebrities to register as donors.
First up was singer Loyiso Bala, who was surprised at how simple and painless the test was.
The next challenge was to Afrikaans singer Kurt Darren. While Darren was unable to register because of his aviation commitments, he did help raise awareness.
Jen Su was number three. Knowing the important role ethnicity plays, her biggest motivation for getting registered was the opportunity to help an Asian child.
The last challenge was put to Kerry McGregor.
Radio and television personality Jeremy Mansfield is a patron of the Sunflower Fund and a cancer survivor.
The 5FM radio presenter DJ Fresh has been raising awareness for years. His nephew died of leukaemia, making his mission a personal one. In 2010, he started the “1 in 100 000” campaign, in which he undertook to “meet” 100 000 people online in 1 000 hours. These are the odds of finding a matching donor.
Criteria for becoming a donor
* Donors must be willing to help anyone, should they be a match.
* They must be aged 18 to 45 years old.
* They must weigh over 50kg.
* They must be in general good health, and must not be at risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases.
* Donors remain on the registry until the age of 60. - Cape Argus