Perfect Match Could Be A Stranger
Published: Jan 23, 2005
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Jerry Gomez needs a match. He hopes the perfect person will come forward. Soon.
Someone who is generous and unselfish. Someone who will make a commitment to him that few people will - without even meeting him.
Gomez needs a bone marrow donor.
The 50-year-old married father of three was diagnosed in 1988 with lymphoma, a form of blood cancer. He has been through chemotherapy and taken experimental drugs, including grape seed extract and radioactive antibodies.
Nothing has worked. Doctors say his best hope is a bone marrow transplant. But that takes a donor who very closely matches his DNA type. Usually that is a family member.
At first he was optimistic.
``I thought, `Oh, gee, you know, I've got an older brother, three younger sisters. One of them's bound to be a match.'' None of them were.
Uncles, cousins, his mom. Just about every immediate family member was tested. None matched.
Looking For Help
So Gomez turned to the National Marrow Donor Program based in Minneapolis. The registry helps those who need a bone marrow transplant find an unrelated donor.
There are more than 5 million people on the registry from around the world. Katrina Holley, marrow donor program director for Florida Blood Services, says all those who sign up are volunteers.
``You're going on the registry, [it's] basically like a pledge that `If my tissue type matches someone, I would be willing to give' them a small amount of my marrow,'' she says.
Unfortunately, Gomez hasn't yet found a match on the registry. But he isn't giving up.
Holley says that makes sense. Florida Blood Services in St. Petersburg is one of 92 centers nationwide that help recruit and test people for the national registry.
Donors Constantly Added
New names are added every day.
``So as we are adding more donors, other centers are adding more donors and his donor could very well come from a drive here or a drive across the country,'' she says.
Bone marrow donor drives are usually held at the same time as blood drives. A sample of blood given during a regular donation can be used to put volunteers on the registry.
A technician fills a small vial with a blood sample so the potential donor can join the registry.
Donors must be between 18 and 60 years old. Those donors who match transplant candidates will be contacted and asked to undergo additional testing. If all goes well, then doctors extract a small amount of healthy bone marrow and drip it into the vein of a recipient.
One of the biggest needs right now is for minority donors. Donors are more likely to match an unrelated recipient with the same ethnic background.
Holley says only 30 percent of the potential donors on the national registry are from minority groups. Eight percent are black, 7 percent are of Latino descent and less than 1 percent are American Indians.
Gomez is Latino. His best chance for a match would be someone from Latino or Mediterranean descent. His cancer is advanced, and doctors are running out of options. Gomez hopes people of Latino descent will hear his story and sign up.
``It could save someone's life,'' he says. ``Maybe even mine.''
A blood and bone marrow donor drive will be held Feb. 5-6 at the Eight on Your Side Health & Fitness Expo at the Tampa Convention Center.
A Florida Blood Services bloodmobile will be located at booth No. 1100 in the West Hall from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Feb. 5 and 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Feb. 6.
There is no charge to join the registry if you sign up during this drive.
Irene Maher's health reports air weeknights on WFLA-TV during the 5 p.m. newscast.
