Baseball Game Aids Marrow Transplants

Baseball fans are invited to support area residents who need bone marrow transplants by attending a baseball game Sunday at Ventura College Stadium.

The first annual “Game for Life,” featuring the Woodland Hills Tigers minor-league team and a local all-star team, will benefit Children for Tomorrow, a Ventura County branch of the National Marrow Donor Program.

A $5 ticket includes game admission and entry in a raffle. Among the hundreds of items to be given away are autographed baseballs and pictures, baseball cards, Oakland A’s tickets and an autographed book about Tommy Lasorda, who will be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on Sunday.

Former Dodger outfielder Ken Landreaux will throw the first pitch and sign autographs after the game, which will run from noon to 4 p.m.

The game is being dedicated to Trish Bradley, an FBI agent from Thousand Oaks who is searching for a marrow donor to help her fight leukemia. Bradley is one of 117 patients in Ventura County who need to find donors. Most of those patients are children. The youngest is 20 months old.

“If I could walk people through Children’s Hospital just once, then nobody would think twice about becoming a marrow donor,” said Lynnette Chandler, regional coordinator of the county’s marrow donor program.

Funds raised from the event will go toward the testing of potential donors.

Bone marrow transplants cure 63 known blood-related illnesses, Chandler said. The trick is to find a matching donor before it is too late, a feat that is especially challenging for patients who have a mixed ethnic background.

“It’s difficult,” said Chandler, whose own 17-year-old daughter could not find a marrow donor to help combat her rare form of aplastic anemia. “But I’ve seen miracles before.”

Any healthy individual between 18 and 60 can donate marrow. Ten minutes of paperwork and a small blood sample will put a potential donor on the national registry until the individual turns 61.

For information on becoming a marrow donor, purchasing tickets to the baseball game or donating $5 for a disadvantaged child to attend the game, call 987-6935.

Tickets are also for sale at Jimmy’s Diner, 596 Mobil Ave., Camarillo; Balloon Magic, 2394 E. Main St., Ventura; Cafe Bellissimo, 105 Brazil St., Thousand Oaks, and El Ranchito, 2765 Wagon Wheel Road, Oxnard.