BURBANK : Bone Marrow Match to Be Sought for Boy

Bone marrow testing begins today for volunteers who want to help an 11-year-old Burbank boy with leukemia.

About 400 people have signed up to be tested at St. Francis Xavier Church, 3801 Scott Road, Burbank, where the boy is a parishioner and a fifth-grader in the church’s school. The church has organized the blood testing drive to be held there Saturday from 1 to 5 p.m.

Testings will also be held at another Catholic church, St. Finbar, 2010 W. Olive Ave., on Sunday from 8 a.m. to 1:15 p.m., and at L. A. Grinding, 305 N. Victory Blvd. on Friday from noon to 4 p.m.

Money from fund-raisers at St. Francis Xavier Church and other local groups is paying for the testing, which will be conducted by the American Red Cross.

Greg Smith has been diagnosed with leukemia for two years but had been in remission. It was not until a relapse in January that doctors and his family knew that he would need a bone marrow transplant to survive. However, no one in his family or the nearly 1 million people listed in the National Bone Marrow Program Registry is a suitable donor.

So the family and the community are trying to find a match locally.

According to the Red Cross, the chances of finding a matching donor increases among people of the same racial group. Smith has Spanish, Scottish and German heritage.