Jocelyn McGlynn is a fourth year Western University student with acute myelomonocytic leukemia who needs a stem cell transplant.
Volunteers at stem cell drive
McGlynn is from Chatham-Kent and has had all of South-western Ontario band together to show her support and help her find a donor. Many of her friends from home are students at Western and they will stop at nothing to help their friend. Western University students have taken a strong role in this search by hosting stem cell swabbing stations throughout the week across campus.
Today was the second day of the drive and they have already signed 212 people up to
OneMatch’s donor registry. They have a goal of getting 600 people registered by 4pm on Friday and to get as many male donors as possible as they are the ideal candidates.
Each person who signs up and has their stem cells tested is agreeing to be contacted if they are a match for anyone until they are 65 years old.
Riley Kitchen is a volunteer for Western’s Stem Cell Club and says that “encouraging as many people as possible to sign up is so important because finding a donor is like finding a needle in a haystack. The more registered donors, the more chances those who are sick have at surviving.”
Kitchen says that many people are scared of registering because they think the process of donating is a long and painful one when in fact that is not true.
The process begins with registering as a donor. People are asked to fill out an information sheet and then swab the inside of their mouths in four different spots.
Initial register process
If that person ends up being a match from someone there are two different ways that stem cells are harvested; peripheral stem cell collection, or bone marrow harvest.
The peripheral collection is done from the blood stream and the bone marrow harvest is done by directly accessing the donors marrow. The latter is what people are normally afraid of, but volunteer Kacey Jones says that it is really not scary.
“When you are a donor you are put under a local anesthetic for the procedure and the recovery is about a week of discomfort. If you ask me, a week of discomfort in exchange for saving a life is not even debatable”
The stem cell drive will take place for the last time tomorrow at Western University’s UCC from 10am-4pm. Blood donation clinics will also be set up throughout the month and the club is encouraging students to pay a visit there as well.
