DKMS Africa Stem Cell Sunflower
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Sandra Nieuwenhuizen planned a stem cell donor drive to help young Liam after the family found out there were no life-saving matches in South Africa!

 

Durbanville, South Africa (02 March 2020) – This coming Wednesday, the 4th of March, the community of Durbanville will be rallying to support the Lotz family. The family recently found out that life-saving stem cell treatment wasn’t an option for their son, as there were no matches for him in South Africa.

Unable to afford international searches, the family became desperate for a match. The best way to find a match is to widen the search, and the only way to do that is to get new donors to register with The Sunflower Fund. This is what inspired Sandra Nieuwenhuizen to host a Stem Cell Donor drive for the Lotz family.

Liam Lotz was diagnosed in 2016, at the age of three, with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) – the most common childhood cancer of the blood and bone marrow that affects white blood cells. Liam spent the next three years and four months fighting his cancer and, with success, went into remission.

Liam and his family celebrated the news and learned to live life normally. They spent seven blissful months not having to worry about cancer or its related treatments when they got a blow of bad news. Liam’s cancer had returned.

“For seven months we tasted a ‘new normal’; we were finally able to focus on doing all the things we missed out on,” – Benita Lotz

Liam has just started a new protocol of treatment at almost eight years of age, and urgently requires a blood stem cell (bone marrow) transplant. He does not have a sibling or family member that is a match, and as such, he requires an unrelated matching donor.

“A patient has the best chance of finding a match from someone within the same cultural or ethnic background as them,” says Kim Webster, Head of Communications at The Sunflower Fund.

“We are essentially looking for Liam’s genetic twin and there is a 1 in 100 000 chance of finding this match,” 

“There is currently no matching donor for Liam. To give him the best chance of finding his life-saving donor, we need South African’s from all walks of life to register,”

To boost the local donor pool, Sandra decided to launch a community donor drive. She created a Facebook event and encouraged her community to join and give Liam a fighting chance.

“We (Liam’s Friends), together with The Sunflower Fund, are calling on our community in Durbanville and surrounding area to PLEASE support this Stem Cell Donor drive for our little friend Liam Lotz. It is non-invasive and basically just a swab inside your mouth to register. Liam desperately needs a donor as there is no registered donor in South Africa at the moment for him. But we also want to register as many people as possible so that we are able to reach more little friends who are going through this.” – Sandra Nieuwenhuizen

As Sandra mentioned, it is effortless to become a Stem Cell Donor, you have a swab taken, and your details are added to the registry. Then you wait. You might not be a match for Liam, but you may match with someone else and end up saving a life anyway.

If you are between the ages of 18 and 45 years with a consistent weight of more than 50kgs and a BMI of less than 40, you could be eligible to become a donor. Below is a detailed explanation of the process.

‘Registering as a donor is non-invasive. After completing a basic health-screening questionnaire, a DNA sample is collected by swabbing the inside of your cheeks for a few seconds with a cotton bud.

Once the HLA (tissue typing) test is completed, your information is stored on The Sunflower Fund’s stem cell registry until you are a match for a patient.

You only ever donate stem cells once in your life when you are identified as a match for a patient.

The process to donate is similar to donating blood. It involves no operations, incisions or anesthetic. Blood is drawn out of the body via one arm. It goes through a machine that separates out the stem cells and blood is returned into your body via the other arm.

There is no cost to individuals to become donors, as The Sunflower Fund covers the cost of the DNA test required to register as a donor. There is also no cost to donate stem cell when you are identified as a match for a patient.’

Liam’s Donor Drive Details

Where: Durbanville Preparatory School
When: Wednesday 04 March 2020 from 8 am to 7 pm.

If you live in and around the Durbanville community or can make your way there during the course of the day, you are invited to come through and register to help save Liam or another patient like him in need of their life-saving match.

If you are not near the area, you can arrange to have your own donor drive. You simply need to set it up with the Sunflower Fund. Drives can be set up at your place of work, sports club, or community organisation. Contact them on 0800 12 10 82 or visit www.sunflowerfund.org for more information.

It takes just 10 minutes to save a life! Benita asks that more people add a new check to their bucket lists.

“Many of us go through life with a bucket list of things we want to achieve but most of our lists don’t include wanting to save a life. I wonder why,”

“We need your help desperately because really the only thing we want on our bucket list is to see our son grow up to be a courageous young man,” – Benita Lotz

Lastly, if you are unable to register, the Sunflower Fund could always use a small donation to help them cover the costs of testing. You can find out how to donate here.


Sources: Sunflower Fund
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About the Author

Tyler Leigh Vivier is a writer for Good Things Guy.

Her passion is to spread good news across South Africa with a big focus on environmental issues, animal welfare and social upliftment. Outside of Good Things Guy, she is an avid reader and lover of tea.

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