Gift of Life Marrow Registry helps children and adults suffering from leukemia, lymphoma, other cancers and genetic disorders find matching donors for lifesaving blood and marrow transplants.
In 2016, Gift of Life marked its 25th anniversary, and to celebrate, the organization adopted a bold new call to action. Gift of Life was launched in 1991 to save the life of Jay Feinberg, a 23-year-old from New Jersey diagnosed with a cancer called Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia. Jay did not have a compatible donor match in his family, so a campaign was launched to find the one person who could save his life.
When Jay was diagnosed with leukemia, the Jewish population was vastly underrepresented in the international marrow donor registries. Due to the tragedy of the Holocaust, many family lines were lost or scattered. Jay was initially told that due to this severe shortage of Jewish donors, his chance of finding a matching Ashkenazi Jewish donor was nearly impossible.
Jay’s family and friends would not accept this and they mounted an immense effort to find the donor they were sure existed somewhere. One volunteer even traveled to Russia to run drives and search for possible matches there. Hundreds of recruitment drives were organized and over 60,000 potential donors joined the registry. Matches were identified for many other patients in need, but none for Jay. In a final, hopeful effort, one last drive was organized by a young man whose close friend was saved by a donor who was tested for Jay. In May 1995, the very last donor tested at that drive turned out to be Jay’s match and he received a successful transplant two months later.
Jay’s search for a donor took four years. Determined to help others in similar circumstances, Jay continued the work begun on his behalf. Today, Gift of Life is an international medical resource, highly regarded for its unique and vital work. A member of the international collaborative, Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide, and an associate registry of the National Marrow Donor Program, Gift of Life ranks fifteenth in size out of seventy-two stem cell registries in fifty-three countries, and is the only registry founded and managed by a transplant recipient.
At present, the organization is searching for a donor for a young Jewish father of three named Adam Krief, who recently was diagnosed with a rare blood cancer. He needs a marrow transplant to survive but does not have a match among the current donors in the registry. Adam is originally from Morocco, so it is possible that his match will be found among people of Sephardic Jewish background, or possibly even Hispanic descent. He is very ill and the situation is dire. He needs a donor match as soon as possible.
Please call Gift of Life Marrow Registry at 561-982-2900 or e-mail [email protected]. Saving the life of this young father would certainly be a wonderful way to bring in the Jewish New Year.
