<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" class="gmail_quote"></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Hello,</span><br style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">I apologize for the anonymity of
this email. I am trying to reach out to Arab-American communities to
help raise awareness about the need for bone marrow donors with our
ethnic background.</p>
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span><font style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" size="2">I am writing to ask for your help and for your good wishes. My
sister, Jessica Cody Abood, was
originally diagnosed with leukemia in January 2006 and spent the
majority of last year fighting the disease. She put in a good fight
though and in March 2006 the cancer went into remission. But, the cancer came
back and the treatment this time around needs to be different. <br>
</font></span></p>
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span>The
doctors have recommended that Jessica receive a bone marrow transplant
as soon as the cancer is in remission, but because of our unique ethnic
heritage (primarily Lebanese and German), she does not currently have a
donor match.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">If
you could reach out to your communities and families to help raise
awareness and recruit donors, I would greatly appreciate your help.</span></p>
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><br></p><p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">For those of you who are
interested, I've pulled together some more information in the attached pdf about getting
tested and the process of donating marrow or blood. To summarize: it's really, really easy.
<span style="font-weight: bold;">To be tested (and added to the registry) all you need to do is get a cheek swab.</span>
That's it. One Q-tip rolled around and you're done. (The process of
donating marrow/blood to a patient is a bit more complicated, but you
always have the choice to donate or not, and they make the process very
simple for the donor.)
</p>
<p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">I cannot overemphasize my plea for individuals from racial or ethnic minority groups to be tested.</span> Of the 4,000,000+ donors in the Registry, there is not one single match for Jessica. So, please please please
<span style="font-weight: bold;">reach out to people that you know who may have Lebanese/Arab ancestry</span>, or help me locate <span style="font-weight: bold;">community organizations or church groups that may have access to Arab-American communities.
</span><br></p><p style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"> The National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) has made great
strides in its efforts to provide matches for more patients. Yet, even with
millions of potential donors and tens of thousands of cord blood units on the
Registry, patients from some racial and ethnic groups remain less likely to find
a suitable match than others. In addition, some patients are unable to find a
suitable match because of the rarity of their tissue traits. Some tissue traits
are more likely to be found among people of a particular racial or ethnic
heritage. That is why <span style="font-weight: bold;">a pressing need remains for more people who identify
themselves as American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African
American, Hispanic or Latino, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, or
multiple-race to volunteer as donors.</span></p>
<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Jessica completes her chemotherapy treatment today and we will know in a few weeks if the treatment was successful.
If her cancer is in remission, she will need a bone marrow transplant.
Please help us improve her chances at life by getting tested, sending
this email far and wide, and sending all the love in the world her way.
<br><br><span style="font-weight: bold;">Thank you.</span><br><br>Lily B. Abood<br><br>
<a href="mailto:lilybrook@gmail.com" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">
lilybrook@gmail.com</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<font style="font-family: trebuchet ms;" size="2"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);">If you'd like to find out more about my leukemia, please visit
</span><a style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);" href="http://www.cancer.gov/" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">
The National Cancer Institute</a><span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 204);"> or </span><a style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);" href="http://www.leukemia.org/" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">
The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society
</a><br style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);"><br style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);">For more information about bone marrow registries, or getting yourself tested, please visit
</span><a style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);" href="http://www.marrow.org/" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">The National Marrow Donor Program</a><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);">
<span style="font-weight: bold;">, </span>or the
</span><a style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 204);" href="http://www.abmdr.org/" target="_blank" onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)">American Bone Marrow Donor Registry</a><span style="font-weight: bold;">
</span></font></span>
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