Will You Be My Match?

When the new year came around, I made a resolution to focus on my health. Unfortunately, I got a lot more than I bargained for… On January 31st, I was diagnosed with Leukemia. It’s still surreal to think of myself as a cancer patient because I had no outward signs of being sick. Sure, I was feeling a bit more tired than usual, but what mom of a 3-year-old toddler isn’t?!?

Through a routine blood test in January to check my A1c levels, I found out I was severely anemic. I'm now thrust into a patient community that I’m realizing needs help to overcome health inequities. As a patient engagement professional, now wearing the hat of a patient, I feel compelled even more to help change the narrative.

Asians are underrepresented in the bone marrow registry, and people like us have a disproportionate chance to cure our blood cancer. In fact, according to the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP), the odds of Asians finding a match is only 47%. It’s even lower at 29% for Blacks, compared to 80% for Whites.

Did you know to find a potential match, it’s basically a saliva swab that takes 5 minutes to do? Did you also know that donating blood stem cell is NOT a surgical procedure but through a fairly painless process similar to donating plasma or platelets? I didn’t know either until just recently! Neither did my wide network of family and friends who are choosing to educate themselves because of me.

A bone marrow transplant may be in my future and there aren’t any ideal matches in the donor database. I’m hoping you and your extended network will register in the database to increase my chances. My match will likely come from someone of East Asian descent between the ages of 18-40.

I’m at the beginning of my cancer journey. I’m recruiting you onto “Team Vivian” because your encouragement and support will see me through this fight of my life. I am gratefully receiving all your positive healing vibes! I have every chance to beat my leukemia. And for that, I am truly grateful.

Sending lots of love,
Vivian (Hui-Wen) Cheng