Who can be a bone marrow donor? What's the process for becoming one?
In general, anyone between the ages of 18 and 60 who's in good health can donate bone marrow. To be considered, potential donors first join a national registry.
People who need a bone marrow transplant often have blood disorders or diseases that affect bone marrow function, such as leukemia, lymphoma or aplastic anemia. A transplant becomes necessary for these people when their bone marrow cannot make enough healthy blood cells, or when the bone marrow has been invaded by a blood cancer.
Although the procedure is called a bone marrow transplant, it's actually the blood-forming stem cells within bone marrow that benefit the transplant recipient. Bone marrow stem cells can develop into different things: red blood cells that carry oxygen to the body, platelets that help blood clot, or white blood cells that help fight infection.
An ideal bone marrow donor should be HLA-matched to the transplant recipient. HLA stands for human leukocyte antigens -- markers on the surface of the cells in the body. The immune system uses these markers to recognize which cells belong in the body and which do not. A test is performed to identify eight of these markers. To match, all eight of those HLAs in the donor need to be identical to those of the recipient.
Siblings usually are tested first as potential donors. If no sibling matches, then the care team turns to the registry run by the National Marrow Donor Program — a federally funded nonprofit that keeps a database of volunteers willing to donate. To join, go to the website bethematch.org and follow the instructions. Once you register on the website, you're sent a kit that you can use to collect cell samples from inside your cheek. After you do that, you send the kit back. There's nothing else you need to do unless you're identified as a potential match.
People selected as a donor from the registry receive a phone call asking if they're willing to come to a transplant center for evaluation. That evaluation involves a review of medical history, a physical exam and blood tests.
In most cases, stem cells for a transplant are collected from blood. First there's an injection of a medication that stimulates bone marrow to produce a large supply of extra stem cells. Several days later, the blood is drawn. Blood is removed from one arm and circulated through a machine that separates out the stem cells. After that, the blood is returned to the body through the other arm.
Less common is a procedure where stem cells are collected directly from bone marrow. That's done in an operating room under general anesthesia and requires a short hospital stay. Needles are inserted through the skin and into the bone to draw the marrow out. The procedure usually lasts one to two hours, and most donors go home the same day. Full recovery takes two to three days.
Currently, about 5,000 bone marrow transplants are done in the United States each year.
Style on 09/23/2019