If you had a chance to save lives with a cheek swab, would you do it?

There are thousands of people that suffer from cancers, like Leukemia, or blood disorders, like aplastic anemia. Their bone marrow has stopped working because of disease, chemotherapy, or radiation. These people can spend years on the Bone Marrow Transplant list, just waiting for a match. Many of these people do not have months, or even weeks to wait for donors to be found. What can be done to help these people find matches?

Are you a person of color? If so, please pay special attention to this message. Those that need transplants are much more likely to match with someone of their race, but there is not enough diversity among donors to help these patients.

In order to see if you match someone who needs a bone marrow transplant, you need to join the bone marrow registry. Joining only requires a cheek swab so that doctors can determine who you may match. If you happen to match someone, there are two possible ways of donation. One is receiving a few days of injections to increase your red blood cell count and then donating. The process of donation is similar to giving blood. The other possible way of donation is a painless procedure where you are put to sleep and bone marrow is taken from your pelvic bone. Doctors decide which method is best for the patient.

After donation, you will recover completely in one to seven days. Signing up on the registry does not mean that you will automatically be matched, but there is always a chance of someone eventually matching with you.

You might ask why patients don't ask family members to help them. The reality is that 70 percent of people do not have a match within their family.

Please consider going to bethematch.org to see if you qualify to join the registry. Bone marrow donation is a painless procedure that can lead to life saving treatments.