In mid-August 2009, two American Red Cross of the National Capital Area’s staff members, Teresa Escobar and Tania Scinto, bonded together with the hopes of saving a life.

Teresa Escobar, Human Resources Coordinator, received a call from Tania Scinto, a local Be The Match^SM Donor Center representative at the National Institute of Health. The call was not business as usual – Tania informed Teresa that, through the Be The Match Registry^SM (http://www.marrow.org/), she had been identified as a potential match for a leukemia patient in need of a bone marrow transplant. 

“When I got the call and was asked if I was still interested in donating my marrow I said yes, there is absolutely no reason not to,” shared Teresa.

At a Chapter-wide staff meeting just months earlier, Teresa and many of her colleagues at the American Red Cross of the National Capital Area connected with Gina Boyd, National Institute of Health Marrow Donor Program Recruitment Coordinator, and registered to be bone marrow donors that same day.

 

Be The Match Foundation^SM helps patients in need of a bone marrow or umbilical cord blood transplant receive the treatment they need. At any given time, 6,000 people are searching the Be The Match Registry^SM to cure one of 70 different blood diseases including leukemia, lymphoma and sickle cell anemia. Seventy percent of patients cannot find a match in their own family and come to us for help, but fewer than 40% of those searching find a match to obtain the transplant they need.

Finding a match is extremely challenging, especially in more ethnically diverse patients since tissue type is inherited, taking a couple of steps to help someone in need is worth the effort. It’s about as easy as donating blood – in this case, you would complete a consent form and do a quick swabbing of your cheek.

Although Teresa is waiting to learn if she is one among only a handful of potential donors, she says, “It’s exciting to know that I can potentially help save a life… If it comes out that I am “the” match, I will definitely donate my marrow, no matter what!”

Previous donor Garrett Stackman, Esq., describes it as a “remarkably easy process… [that gives] the family the certainty that they did everything humanly possible to try to save a loved one”. Garrett and his recipient are winning the “fight against cancer” together.

"I do consider this one of the more important things I'll do in my life,” said by Garrett Stackman and other donors.