The New Zealand Blood Service desperately needs more male bone marrow donors of Maori and Pacific ethnicity.
Each year, many patients are diagnosed with leukaemia or other serious blood disorders. These diseases prevent the blood cells from maturing and functioning properly. For many of these patients a bone marrow transplant is the best and only hope for a cure.
New Zealand Blood Service marketing co-ordinator Nephi Arthur said ethnic background played an important role in bone marrow donation.
‘‘New Zealand is one of the most culturally diverse countries with the highest proportion of Polynesian people in the world.’’
European patients in need of a bone marrow transplant have access to more than 15 million Europeans on worldwide registries, while there are only 10,000 Maori and Pasifika people registered on the New Zealand Bone Marrow Registry.
A bone marrow donor and patient must have matching tissue types and people were most likely to match a close relative. The closer the tissue types, the better the chances of a successful transplant.
However, only one in three patients had a matched family member and the bone marrow registry would search databases in New Zealand and around the world to find a match if necessary.
‘‘It is hard for families waiting for a donor to be found — there’s the pressure of trying to find a donor, concern about what will happen if they don’t find one, and a high need for support.
‘Often a bone marrow transplant is the only hope of a cure. Signing up to the bone marrow registry is a chance to save a life,’’ Mr Arthur said.
Each year the registry was searching for bone marrow donors for about 90 patients who did not match any family members, and each year there were about 50 transplants. ‘‘So the others we obviously couldn’t find matches for.’’
An important message the blood service wanted to get across was that donating bone marrow was a lot less invasive than it used to be.
‘‘The most common way now is you can donate it just like giving blood, with a needle in your arm — they’ll spin it down and take off the bone marrow, and give you back the rest.
‘‘You don’t have to go into hospital under general anesthetic, you can normally go back to work the next day and the registry pays for everything — travel, accommodation and loss of wages for you and a support person.’’
University of Otago student Warren Walker, who is of Maori ethnicity, regularly gives blood and plasma, and in July this year he signed up to the New Zealand Bone Marrow Registry.
‘‘All I have to give is a little bit of my time and, indirectly, it can help other people. It’s a good thing to do,’’ he said.
If matched with someone in need of a bone marrow transplant he would be more than happy to participate, he said.
‘‘I’ve read what they do and what is required — but that’s minimal to give someone else the opportunity to live.’’
He encouraged others to sign up for the registry as well as give blood and plasma.
'‘If they meet the criteria and can give the time to the process then it’s a good thing to do. They make the process really easy here. Plasma donors are given a drink and something to eat. The staff are wonderful and make it really easy for you.’’
• The NZ Bone Marrow Registry has made a commitment to focus on actively enrolling males aged 18 to 40 of Maori or Pacific ancestry. For more information go to www.nzblood.co.nz .
