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| Indian American searches for donor |
| Search for a perfect donor in the United States is becoming quite an uphill task for 28-year-old Vinay Chakravarthy
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| UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
, 16-June-2007
2:49:57 AM |
| When medical students Vinay and Rashmi got married, they thought they had found in each other a partner for life.
Today, they are on the look out for another match for Vinay- one that could save his life.
Ethnic factor
Vinay, a Boston based doctor has leukemia. Despite four rounds of chemotherapy the cancer keeps coming back. His doctors now say his only chance at survival is a stem cell transplant. All he needs to find is a matching donor.
The United States National Bone Marrow Registry has more than six million potential donors on its rolls and so one would think that finding Vinay a match would be easy.
However, because Vinay is an Indian American, that has not been the case. Ethnicity is a determining factor in finding a DNA match and so a patient's best chance at finding a donor is within their racial and ethnic community.
But only one percent of the US registry are South Asians.
''For every Caucasian who suffers from leukemia who goes to the US National Registry, they find at least 15 identical matches. But none if u're a South Asian,'' said Vinay, www.helpvinay.org.
Simple process
Ironically, at a time when he should not be exerting himself, Vinay and other South Asians who need stem cell transplant have no choice but to launch a search and find their own stem cell donors.
According to the US National Registry it would take 1 in 20,0000 south Asians to find a match.
Vinay's friends and family are holding donor drives across America encouraging South Asians to come register themselves-a simple process that involves taking a sample of their cheek cells.
''When I met Vinay I was 22-years-old, we got married when I was 24 and now I am 26. I am pretty young and I am looking forward to spending the rest of my life with my husband and I need your help. I think we need to help every one that we can in our community because no body else will help us. We have to help our selves,'' said Rashmi Rao, www.helpvinay.org.
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