Campus Blood Test Seeks Marrow Match for Girl With Disease : Health: Thousand Oaks High will screen for suitable donor for 13-year-old student.

If enough people take a simple 15-minute blood test, Valerie Sun may be able to live a normal life.

All day today, Valerie will be watching anxiously as potential donors line up on the Thousand Oaks High School campus for a screening test to see if their bone marrow matches that of the 13-year-old girl.

Valerie has aplastic anemia, an often-fatal blood disease. For two years she has unsuccessfully searched for a marrow donor, with the help of agencies from all over Southern California, including United Blood Services, the Red Cross and Asians for Miracle Marrow Matches.

But the group that has been most passionate about helping Valerie has been a few teen-agers closer to home--her fellow students at Thousand Oaks High.

They have held bake sales, peddled doughnuts and candy, collected aluminum cans and paid visits to businesses around Thousand Oaks trying to raise money for today’s event.

“It’s really neat,” Valerie said. “A lot of people don’t even know me and yet they are doing this stuff for me.”

The students, led by Kelly Rossborough and Justin Saltzman, collected $4,500. The blood tests are simple and painless, but--at $45 per person--not cheap. The students thought that if they could eliminate the cost for donors, they could encourage more people to participate.

They already have 100 people signed up to take the test today, and the National Bone Marrow Donor Program Registry has agreed to match the locally raised funds, providing free tests to about 100 more. Additionally, the group will give free tests to any minority that volunteers for the screening.

Although there already are 1.3 million people listed in the registry, chances of finding matches are slim for most leukemia and aplastic anemia patients--about one in a million.

For minority patients--Valerie is half Chinese and half white--those odds are reduced by the fact that only 17% of the registered donors are nonwhite.

While it is possible for her to find a donor outside her ethnic group, doctors believe matches are more likely among people with the same racial background.

“A lot of times these tissue types can be traced back to geographic locations,” said Yuko Yamauchi, recruitment coordinator for Asians for Miracle Marrow Matches. “But it’s not unusual to find a cross. I remember we found a match for a Latino man with someone who was half Japanese and half white.”

Asians for Miracle Marrow Matches successfully found a match for Ventura resident Katalina Um in 1993. Tragically, Um, who suffered from leukemia, died before the transplant could be done.

Yamauchi said the effort by students is unusual and impressive. Normally the group does not turn to schools for help in finding marrow matches because donors must be between 18 and 55.

“This has been disappointing to a lot of students because they aren’t 18 yet, but they want to be tested,” she said. “They ask us if they can do it with permission from their parents. But they have to be 18.”

Valerie’s mother, Michele Brown, said the student response has been overwhelming.

“We’re all very impressed and very grateful,” Brown said. “It’s a lot of work. I never could have done it just on my own.

“Traditionally I don’t think high schools get involved in this kind of marrow drive,” she added. “It just shows what kind of impact they can have. Even if they don’t find someone for my daughter, they are increasing awareness. Maybe people might not register this time, but if they hear about it, they might do it next time.”

For now, Valerie, the students and school staff will watch and wait.

“We’re just going to keep our fingers and toes crossed,” said athletic secretary Barbara Safe. “There could be someone right around the corner that might be the perfect match for Valerie. You never know.”

Anyone wanting to be tested may drop by Thousand Oaks High School from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. today. Call (213) 626-3406 for more information.