A fellow student who is finishing up her first year in school is battling a very aggressive form of leukemia and needs help from all of us. If she does not find a match for bone marrow transplant, she will die in less than 6 months. Please sign up to register as a potential donor: you may be that one match she needs and you may be able to save her life.
This usually costs $52 but use the code BK041309 between TODAY and April 30th, and it will be free.
She does not have much time so please join NOW and forward this to all of your contacts!
See below for an email from her family and the bottom of this note for myths and facts about donating bone marrow.
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Natasha Collins is an outstanding 26 year-old Yale medical student who is battling leukemia for the second time, and she needs your help to save her life. At the age of 23, Natasha was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML). After two years of treatment, followed by a cord blood transplant, Natasha came to the Yale School of Medicine to pursue her dream of becoming a doctor. Unfortunately, during her first year as a medical student Natasha was re-diagnosed with leukemia. She braved chemotherapy, and now she needs a bone marrow transplant to save her life. But out of the millions of registered bone marrow donors worldwide, Natasha does not have a match. We are asking you to register because you could be Become Natasha's Hero.
Please consider registering for the Be the Match Registry. Our online drive for Natasha is April 21-30. You can register for free at www.marrow.org using the code BK041309. By joining the Registry, you give hope to patients everywhere with leukemia, lymphoma and a variety of other diseases. When you register as a bone marrow donor, you join a global movement of more than 12 million donors who stand ready to give someone a future. You may never be called upon to donate, but if you are, you and perhaps only you will have the power to save a life.
A little about Natasha: She grew up in Syracuse, NY, with her mom, dad and younger brother (Anne, Ted and Teddy). Natasha graduated magna cum laude from Cornell University and is now a student at the Yale School of Medicine. In addition to being a stellar student, loving daughter, and generous friend, Natasha loves to cook, knit, travel, and eat carrot cake. From her volunteering to her teaching chemistry in Qatar, Natasha has touched many lives. She has a bright future as a doctor and we need your help to make this dream come true.
Natasha is half African American and half Caucasian, making her a molecular minority because her bone marrow is difficult to match. A match for her is likely to also be of mixed heritage. Minority and mixed heritage donors are underrepresented in the Registry and very much needed. That being said, we encourage everyone to sign up to offer hope to all those looking for donors.
Registering is simple and takes as little as five minutes, and our online drive will allow you to register for free. You will be asked to fill out a basic form with your contact information and medical history (which remains protected), and then you will swab the insides of your cheeks with a kit that is mailed to your home. No blood draw is required. Your saliva is all that is needed to register. Five minutes of your time today could mean a lifetime for someone like Natasha.
Share Natasha's story with your friends and family, especially those of minority background as the Registry is actively seeking more minority members. With a few e-mail and phone calls, you can get the word out about the importance of registering. They could be Natasha's match. And save her life.
MYTH: The bone marrow donation procedure is painful.
FACT: General or regional anesthesia is always used for this procedure. Donors feel no needle injections and no pain during marrow donation.
MYTH: All bone marrow donations involve surgery.
FACT: The majority of donations do not involve surgery. The patient's doctor most commonly requests a peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) donation, which is non-surgical and does not require a stay in the hospital. If marrow is requested, it is a surgical procedure, but there is still usually no stay in the hospital.
MYTH: Pieces of bone are removed from the donor.
FACT: Pieces of bone are not removed from the donor in either type of donation. A PBSC donation involves taking the drug filgrastim for five days leading up to donation in order to increase the donor's needed blood-forming cells. On the fifth day, blood is taken from the donor through one arm, passed through a machine that separates out the blood-forming cells, and returned through the donor's other arm. In marrow donation, no pieces of bone are taken; only the liquid marrow found inside the bones is needed to save the patient's life.
MYTH: Donating bone marrow is dangerous and weakens the donor.
FACT: Though no medical procedure is without risk, there are rarely any long-term effects from donating. Only five percent or less of a donor's marrow is needed to save a life. After donation, the body replaces the donated marrow within four to six weeks. The NMDP screens all donors carefully to ensure they are healthy and that the procedure is safe. The NMDP also educates donors, answers questions at every step, and follows up after donation.
MYTH: Donors have to pay for the donation procedure.
FACT: Donors never pay for donating. All medical costs are paid by the patient's medical insurance or by the patient, sometimes with NMDP assistance. The NMDP reimburses donors for travel costs, and may reimburse other costs on a case-by-case basis.
Become Natasha's Hero is a community of Natasha's family and friends searching for her bone marrow donor match. We love Natasha, and we need your help to save her life and those of many others in need of a bone marrow match. For questions and to offer support to Natasha and her family, please email matchnatasha@gmail.com
In general, racial minorities are less likely to find a match for their bone marrow donation so even if you are not a match for natasha, you will very likely match for someone else, who is fighting cancer and dying unless they get those stem cells from you. please consider helping! takes 5 mins to register: 1. fill out this: http://www.marrow.org/JOIN/Join_Now/join_now.html 2. enter code BK041309 to waive the $53 registration fee. thanks!
it's not that the leukemia is rare, it's just that it's usually hard for racial minorities and people of mixed race to find a match in the bone marrow registry: her father is black and her mother is white. People who do find a match almost always find a match within their own race (90% of the time) so we need more minorities and people of mixed race to register. e.g. if a nepali would need marrow, their chances of finding a match will increase if more nepalis sign up to register.
Even if you won't match with natasha, you are still likely to save someone's life. and contrary to popular beliefs, it's not a very painful procedure (they use anasthetic and you don't need to spend the night at the hospital.
For some reason the free code is not working tonight but will work starting tomorrow morning. Please sign up!
By the time i get your email address, it will probably be late. Please do contact Univeristy of Utah, they have one of the best BMT (bone marrow Transplant) programs in the US. All the people from US go there for treatment. I would be glad to provide you with more info if you can provide me with your email address.
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