Bone Marrow Transplant – Become a donor

Prior to becoming a photographer, I was a Child Life Specialist at Schneider Children’s Hospital, now Cohen Children’s Hospital and worked in the Hematology/Oncology and Bone Marrow Transplantation Units.

The beautiful little girl below was one of my patients when I worked there. I just learned that she recently had a Bone Marrow Transplant that has cured her from Sickle Cell Anemia.

Did you read that?!?! CURED her!!!

The transplant was from an UNRELATED DONOR…… Proving the importance as to why more ethnic races, mix of ethnicity, etc NEED to register on the Bone Marrow Registry for donation.

Miss Hunter recently had a Bone Marrow Transplant at the age of 14 that has cured her of Sickle Cell Anemia.

Check out her story with this video here: HUNTER

The NATIONAL BONE MARROW DONOR PROGRAM website is filled with resources and information on how to become a Bone Marrow Donor

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Cord Blood

I love that St. Baldricks uses this image so much in their marketing campaigns.

The little boy with me is a friend and cancer survivor after having a Bone Marrow Transplant at 18 months of age. I shaved my head for St. Baldricks in March 2008.

It is heartbreaking how expensive it is to bank your child’s cord blood, especially after research has shown time and time again that Cord Blood/Bone Marrow SAVES lives!!

4 million babies are born in the United States each year. I can’t even imagine the percentage of those cords that get thrown out. Cords that could be a match to save a life one day or be used for stem cell research. I have watched 1st hand when I was a Child Life Specialist in a pediatric Bone Marrow Unit of a Children’s Hospital in NY, how hard it is for children/families to find a bone marrow/ cord match to save the life of their child. And I watched those never find a match.

Mix in some ethnicities and the chances of finding a match decrease to an even smaller percentage…… Which is why I have been so wanting to donate Baby Girl’s cord blood since she is my mix of stuff and her father is 1/2 Black and 1/2 Dutch.

Throwing out cords is such a waste. We need to have more public banking systems. The chances of one needing their own cord blood are slim but the chances of it matching to save the life of another are pretty high.

I just found the public donation sites today (of all days! ❤ )

Check out this link, or click below for a list of PUBLIC DONATION SITES FOR CORD BLOOD

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