A Hunt OF Hope

The first step toward saving a life could be as simple as wiping the inside of your cheek with a cotton swab.

Testing the cells that the swab picks up can determine if a potential donor matches the tissue type of a person needing a stem-cell transplant to fight a life-threatening illness.

On Saturday, Division 5 of Kiwanis International will hold the Julia Walls Kiefer Marrow Donor Project, a drive that could provide a potential donor for Kiefer, who may need a second stem-cell transplant to treat her non-Hodgkins lymphoma and multiple myeloma. The drive will take place at College Park Baptist Church.

Kiefer, 41, is one of thousands of people in the United States whose diseases could be cured by what are usually referred to as bone-marrow transplants. Stem cells are produced in bone marrow.

For some people, a transplant is their only hope.

In most cases, stem cells, are harvested through apheresis. In that process, technicians collect blood, remove stem cells and return the blood to the donor. In some cases, cells are removed from the marrow of the hip bone, usually an outpatient surgical procedure done under anesthesia. Donors will likely feel some fatigue and soreness afterward for a few days up to a few weeks.

Roby Walls, Kiefer's father, enlisted the help of his fellow Kiwanians to sponsor the drive, which is intended to recruit potential donors for Kiefer and others, to educate participants on bone-marrow donation and to raise money to pay for potential donors who can't afford to be tested. The initial test costs $52. If a match is made, the donor will not be asked to pay for any subsequent tests or procedures.

Walls, a past president of the Winston-Salem Kiwanis Club, called Sue Hendricks in October. He told Hendricks, the lieutenant governor of Division 5, Kiefer's story and talked about his desire to hold a bone-marrow drive.

Kiefer, the mother of a 6-year-old son, Alan, had felt pain through her midsection last summer. Her chiropractor suggested she might be having gall-bladder trouble, so she went for a checkup. Her doctor found that she was anemic. Further testing revealed the cancers.

Kiefer was at that time healthy enough to have a transplant of her own stem cells, but a second transplant, which may be needed in a few months, will have to come from a donor. She spent months undergoing chemotherapy, which has left her immune system weakened. She avoids crowds. Recently, when Alan needed to go to the doctor, his grandfather took him while Kiefer sat in the car. They communicated by cell phone.

Knowing that his daughter may need another transplant to save her life, Walls decided to do all he could to make the drive a success.

Walls asked Hendricks, "Do you think any Kiwanis Club would like to help?" She answered, "Sure. I'll see to it." The division had been looking for a service project, she said, and the fit seemed right. Kiwanis Clubs emphasize helping children, and blood cancers that could be cured by stem-cell transplants strike many young children. Hendricks didn't have much trouble getting Kiwanis members interested.

"Once people listened to Roby do a presentation at a club meeting, that was it," she said. "Two or three minutes in, heads would be nodding."

Hendricks, too, has done talks on behalf of the drive.

"Give me a topic as important as this, and I'll make a speech," she said.

According to the National Marrow Donor Program, on any given day, 6,000 individuals are in need of a transplant. Only 30 percent find a match. Tissue types are inherited, and donors with diverse ethnic and racial backgrounds are in short supply. Representatives from the program will attend the drive and assist with the testing.

The clubs in Hendricks' division, which include Forsyth County, Mount Airy, Salisbury and King, have raised $7,000 to help pay for donors who can't afford the test.

Clubs will also provide volunteers to work at the drive.

Donors must be between the ages of 18 and 60 and be willing to donate to any patient, not just the patient the drive is being conducted for. They will be asked questions about their medical background.

Donors who are added to the bone-marrow registry can remove their names at any time.

Salisbury Kiwanis Charities, the Twin City Kiwanis Foundation and the Winston-Salem Kiwanis Community Fund are accepting tax-deductible donations for the drive.

■ Janice Gaston can be reached at 727-7364 or at jgaston@wsjournal.com.

If you go

The Julia Walls Kiefer Marrow Donor Project will run from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at College Park Baptist Church at 1701 Polo Road. The test consists of a cheek swab and costs $52. Money is available for people who cannot pay.

For more information, contact Roby Walls at 768-0900 or Sue Hendricks at 978-5028.

For more information on bone-marrow donation, visit www.marrow.org.