LOUISVILLE, Ky. — UofL Health is stressing the need to diversify the pool of bone marrow donors.
The organization said one of the biggest issues within fighting blood cancer is a lack of diversity among bone marrow donors.
Much of it has to do with finding a match and Dr. Mohamed Hejazi, chief of bone marrow transplants at Brown Cancer Center, said Caucasians have more than a 70% chance of finding a match while African American patients have only about 25%.
“It really matters the ethnic and racial background of those donors that are signing up to be donors for the future because the chances of matching for certain groups, ethnic groups or race are very different from others,” he said.
Dr. Hejazi also stressed the need for diversity in terms of age and added that donations from younger donors tend to have a better effect on patients and are very much needed.
For more information on how you can donate bone marrow, check out Be The Match.
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