Transplant needed!

On April 16th, my oncologist also began the proceedings needed for me to have a bone marrow transplant, which included swabbing the inside of my cheeks and sending the sample to a national donor registry.  This was not information I wanted to hear.  I was hopeful that the disease had been caught early enough that the chemo would put me into remission and a transplant would not be needed.  I now believe a transplant is standard treatment for my type of leukemia.

I have been referred to Dr. Mehta at Northwestern in Chicago for the transplant. I will have a consultation meeting with him on Friday, May 22nd.

I have also received several calls from transplant support specialists from Northwestern, all of whom have been very friendly and informative. One is Stacie, the transplant coordinator. At the time of her first call, Stacie told me that there are twelve categories used to compare a donor to a recipient, ten of which must match perfectly. The other two categories are called "permissible mismatches" - not necessary for a successful transplant, but certainly helpful. She told me she had one anonymous donor already who matched me in 11 of the 12 categories, and she could see several others which were strong candidates.

My brother has also sent blood samples to Northwestern to see if he would be a match. Interestingly, we only have a 25% chance of being a total match. I suspect there could also be genetic components taken in to consideration -- if my disease had any genetic cause and my brother also carries that genetic risk, then he may not be a match.

If I had any children, they would have a 50% chance of being a match.

I would like to take a moment to thank the family members who have offered to be tested as a possible donor. We'll see if it gets to that point!