Grant Aims to Increase Marrow Donors

In August, Shannon Cady of Fallbrook became alarmed when she noticed how easily her daughter Antoinette seemed to get bruises. Doing the normal things 2-year-olds do caused blue and purple bruises on her body.

Shortly afterward, aplastic anemia was diagnosed in “Anni,” as she is called. Aplastic anemia is a bone marrow disease in which the production of blood cells and platelets in the marrow is slowed or stopped.

Anni is in good condition now, and doctors at Children’s Hospital are monitoring her white blood cells, which may increase because of the medication she is taking. But, if the medication does not cause a change by spring, a bone marrow transplant is the only cure.

Since August, Anni’s parents and the San Diego Blood Bank have been searching for a donor whose bone marrow matches hers. Anni has had 38 blood transfusions and has a catheter implanted in her body to draw blood for tests and to receive medication.

The odds for a match in most cases are 1 in 20,000, San Diego Blood Bank spokeswoman Stephanie Casenza said. But, because Anni is part Latina and native American, the chances for a perfect match are slimmer. Further complicating the search is the $75 fee--to cover the cost of the marrow typing--that deters many potential donors.

However, a grant to the San Diego Blood Bank from the National Marrow Donor Program might make Anni’s chances a little better.

The grant, in the form of testing supplies and equipment, was offered to the San Diego Blood Bank and five others in the United States in order to increase the number of ethnic donors--especially African Americans, Asians, Native Americans and Latinos--on record at the national donor program’s national registry. The grant allows the blood bank to waive the $75 fee and test 2,400 people free when they donate one pint of blood.

Usually the fee is paid by the donor or the family looking for a match for a patient, but the cost is not covered by insurance and can become a burden, Casenza said.

Only 3% of the 408,000 donors in the national registry are Latino, and less than 1% are native Americans, blood bank spokeswoman Lynn Stedd said.

Time for 15-month-old leukemia sufferer Michelle May of San Diego has run out. Her parents announced last week that they have ended the search for a marrow donor, said Carole Maida, who helped raise more than almost $40,000 for the family and is now acting as the family’s spokeswoman. Chemotherapy treatments have ceased having an effect, and doctors have little hope that she will go into remission, which is necessary before doctors can do a marrow transplant, Maida said.

Maida heads the Joanna Maida Foundation, named after her daughter who died of leukemia six years ago. The foundation helps families of leukemia sufferers raise funds for hospital bills and everyday expenses, she said. The Mays raised $39,697 through fund-raisers and the National Marrow Donor Program donated an additional $25,000 to type more than 1,036 people, said Maida. No matches were found.

Three of the blood bank’s four San Diego centers--in Escondido, El Cajon and Hillcrest--are offering free bone marrow typing when a pint of blood is donated, Casenza said. To be eligible, potential donors must be between the ages of 18 and 55, have no history of cancer, asthma, serious heart problems or circulation diseases.