On May 12, students from David Dubransky’s fourth grade class at Tunnell Elementary will be asking shoppers at the Town Center mall in Santa Maria to take a quick and easy test to register for the national bone marrow donor list. The students will be stationed outside Claire’s jewelry shop on the lower level of the mall from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
They will talk to people about the bone marrow registry and the need for bone marrow donors. Additional volunteers will be on hand to help potential donors with paperwork and to administer the test, which is easy and painless. Volunteers will take a quick DNA sample on the inside of the cheek with a cotton swab. The students are partnering with the “Be the Match” donor organization for the drive.
The class chose to help with the bone marrow registry as a community service project after hearing about a young boy in Utah, Jonah Gomez, who has two rare blood disorders. Gomez needs a bone marrow transplant to survive. The students are hoping there may be a match for Gomez locally. Also, Dubransky, the students’ teacher, has a brother who had a successful bone marrow transplant two years ago.
Registering for the donor list is free. Potential donors must be between the ages of 18 and 60 and in good health. Donors with diverse racial or ethnic backgrounds are especially needed. There are thousands of people around the country diagnosed with blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, sickle cell and other life-threatening diseases who need bone marrow transplants.
Approximately 70 percent of patients don’t have a donor in their families and depend on the Be the Match Registry to find an unrelated bone marrow donor. Doctors search the “Be the Match” Registry to find donors who match their patients. Donors who match patients are often asked to donate either bone marrow or cells from circulating blood. Both procedures are usually outpatient.
The fourth graders are also raising money to help pay for “Be the Match” to process the DNA samples of people who sign up.
For more information, visit marrow.org.
Managing Editor Amy Asman compiled this week’s Community Corner. Send comments or ideas to the Sun via e-mail at intern@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in May 3-10, 2012.
