Thiruvananthapuram: Thousands of people are gathering at a sample collection center in Thiruvananthapuram to find a matching stem cell donor for Sreenand, a seven-year-old boy, suffering from a rare form of blood cancer. Sreenand's stem cells are all destroyed due to illness and his bone marrow no longer produces blood. This boy is at present surviving by routine blood transfusion, with his survival only possible through stem cell therapy.
Sreenand is the son of Ranjith Babu and Asha, residents of Ulloor in Tiruvananthapuram. The boy was under treatment at Amrutha Hospital in Kochi where he was diagnosed with this rare form of blood cancer two months ago. As per information, with all efforts to find a matching donor for Sreenand from his family and also from the world stem cell donor registry that has so far failed, a blood donors' firm has launched a campaign in the city.
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People are thronging to the camp after coming to know about the condition of the boy through media reports. At the center, saliva samples of volunteers are collected and checked for the match through the HLA-typing test. The test results come after 45 days.
The organizers hope to find a matching stem cell donor for Sreenand. Any healthy person who is aged between 18 and 50 can be a donor. If the samples match with Sreenand's, the donor needs to give only one bottle of his blood for the boy's treatment.
The blood donor firm said that it will publish the results of the donors in its registry and hope that it would soon find a suitable donor for the boy.
