Bone Marrow Gives Ill Girl Lease on Life : Medicine: The 17-month-old Anaheim patient is responding well to the transplant, officials at a Seattle hospital say.

A 17-month-old Orange County girl is responding “remarkably well” to a bone marrow transplant performed at a Seattle hospital, officials said Thursday.

Stephanie Rudat, who suffers from leukemia, received the transplant late Wednesday at the Fred Hutchinson Research Center. The next 100 days, and especially the next two weeks, will be a critical period for Stephanie, said hospital spokeswoman Susan Edmonds.

Because the transplant involves the introduction of foreign bone marrow into the baby’s system, there is a strong possibility that she will reject it. The procedure also destroys the patient’s immune system, leaving Stephanie vulnerable to infections.

“The patient is very susceptible to any illness. Even a cold could be fatal,” Edmonds said.

Stephanie was diagnosed with non-lymphocetic leukemia when she was 6 weeks old. Chemotherapy helped send her illness into remission, and last summer the baby had an autologous transplant, in which her own bone marrow was removed, chemically treated and reinserted into her body with the hope that all the cancer had been killed.

However, she had a relapse.

Last June, the Rudats suffered another setback when they discovered their insurance money had run out after costs reached $1 million. Medi-Cal agreed to take over but more problems awaited the Anaheim family.

A statewide search for a bone marrow donor proved unsuccessful. A donor was found by the Hutchinson center, but Medi-Cal balked at paying for a procedure outside the state.

A meeting between hospital and Medi-Cal officials paved the way for an agreement when it was disclosed that the Seattle donor was Stephanie’s last chance for survival.

“I hope the baby doesn’t get any bad reaction from receiving the bone marrow,” Farhat Rudat, Stephanie’s mother, said in an interview from Seattle. “The doctors tell me she is reacting better than other babies with this type of procedure.”

For the next four months, the Rudat family--including Stephanie’s 3-year-old sister, Christine--will be living in a Seattle hotel and watching over Stephanie. The baby must remain hospitalized and endure daily blood-cell counts to make sure her body is reacting well to the new bone marrow.

“Baby Stephanie is doing very well for all that she has been through,” Rudat said. “She always wants attention and she is always smiling.”

Rudat said she is fully aware that the bone marrow transplant could leave Stephanie vulnerable to disease and death.

“We’ve been told the survival rate is very poor but we have to give baby Stephanie a chance to live,” she said. “She never gives up and she always seems so normal.”