MARROW BE A MATCH, SAVE A LIFE!

Text: Morgane Vine | President of Marrow Switzerland

Every year, over 1100 people in Switzerland get ill with life-threatening diseases like leukemia or other blood born diseases. A Blood Stem Cell Transplantation is often the last and best option for a cure. However, due to the presence of specific surface proteins on the cells, the number of possible donors is limited. In Switzerland, only 25% of patients can find a compatible donor.

Marrow Switzerland aims to contribute to find a suitable donor for each patient in need of a blood stem cell donation. We are a student organisation composed of a national Executive Board and sections in Bern, Lausanne, Basel, Fribourg, Luzern and Geneva. Filled with commitment and enthusiasm, we work on four main pillars to achieve our goal.

1. Raising awareness on blood diseases and blood stem cell donation. Presentations in universities, social media, distribution events and activities fairs are some of the tools we use to spread the word and inform potential donors.

2. Training the members. As we want to make sure the information we give to potential donors is of quality and up to date, each section has to train their members based on a national booklet. This document has been revised with our partner Swiss Transfusion SRC in 2022 to include the most recent guidelines. We also organize workshops during our general assemblies with experts from the field.

3. Promotion and registration of new well informed donors by supporting them into filling out the registration form and organising swabbing events. We make sure new donors are well aware of what they are getting into. It is important for people to be correctly informed to be valuable donors as we hope potential donors will keep commited to saving a life when the opportunity presents itself. Let’s say we prefer quality to quantity. The essential principles are solidarity, consent, anonymity and free of charge.

4. Fundraising. The registration of a new donor costs 140 francs. However, we do not want to money to be an obstacle to a life-saving donation. To tackle this issue we organize fundraising events such as concerts, mulled wine and pastry sales, the selling of merchandise and many more. You may have heard about the Leukemia Charity Run which was a great success and raised a lot of money to cover the expenses of registrations and donations. Since 2016, Marrow has raised more than 200'000 CHF !

2022 Outcomes:

178’000 in the Swiss Blood Stem Cell Donor Register, 64% females and 36% males.

8'138 new registered donors of which 251 were registered by Marrow !

89 donations, which is 30% more than in 2021, which is a new record !

Point of information

• Who can be a donor ? In Switzerland, any healthy person between the age of 18 and 40 can register as a potential blood stem cell donor. From a medical point of view, young men are the perfect donors.

• The production of the blood cells is located in the bone marrow. These cells develop into red blood cells, white blood cells and the blood platelets.

• Peripheral Donation : It is the procedure used in 80% of the donations in Switzerland. Growth factors are given 5 days before the donation whose method is called apharesis and will take around 3 to 6 hours.

• Central donation : This procedure is only used in 20% of the donations. It is a punction of the bone marrow, under general anesthesia. 2-3 days at the hospital might be required.

• The Blood Stem Cell Registry is international, so a donation can go anywhere in the world but a person will register and donate in their respective country.

Want to save a life too ? (in 5 easy steps)

• Type https://register.blutstammzellspende. ch/registrierung/

• Fill in the online form

• You will receive the test kit by post at home so that you can take the oral mucosa sample yourself. The saliva sample should then be returned to us.

• As soon as the laboratory has determined your HLA characteristics, you will be entered in the Swiss Blood Stem Cell Donor Register and recieve your donor card.

• If you appear to be compatible with someone in need, Swiss Transfusion SRC will contact you.

For more information, contact:

Mail: marrow@swimsa.ch

Website: www.marrow.ch

Instagram: marrow_ch