Imagine being 15 again for just one moment. You enjoy talking on the phone, laughing with your friends and daydreaming about upcoming dances. You cherish your youth, a carefree time of unbridled excitement and fun.
Now imagine lying in a bed at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, fighting against a ruthless disease that is trying to take your life.
Sadly, Shaneemah Branch has been faced with the latter over the past few months. Rather than worrying about boyfriends and starting classes at Girls’ High, Branch’s daily concerns center on whether she will find the bone marrow transplant needed to save her life.
The youth, diagnosed in March 2002 with acute myeloid leukemia — the most aggressive form of the disease — thought she had the illness beaten after she went into remission for almost eight months.
When the cancer returned this May, Branch’s family noticed with concern that her attitude was different.
"She dealt with the leukemia great the first time," said her father, Derrick. "This time, though, it’s really sapped her of her strength. She keeps telling us that she’s tired, but we’re trying to make her fight it."
Even with the support of her father, grandmother and other relatives, Branch, of 18th and McKean streets, is facing seemingly insurmountable odds.
She is plagued by mouth sores that make it excruciatingly painful for her to eat and, until recently, had grown increasingly defiant about taking her daily medication — which her father said often consists of nearly 20 pills — on top of the exhausting rounds of chemotherapy.
Branch’s only hope for survival lies in a bone marrow transplant — a procedure that carries many misconceptions, according to Emma Wilson, former director of Dixon House and a breast cancer survivor.
"Most people think that a donor goes through a whole lot, and that scares them. They need to realize that they can wind up saving someone’s life," Wilson said.
Indeed, compared to the arduous process recipients go through, bone marrow donors face a relatively easy path. Bone marrow — the spongy tissue found inside bones that contains the stem cells used to produce the body’s white and red blood cells — is removed with a needle through the rear hip bone, where a large percentage of marrow is located.
Doctors typically take 2 percent of a donor’s marrow, which the body replaces in four to six weeks. The entire procedure is done under anesthesia without any surgical incisions. Most donors feel mild discomfort after the procedure, but after a few days they can go back to their normal activities.
Recipients, on the other hand, face the most physically and emotionally debilitating experience of their lives. Before they can receive the transplant, their original bone marrow is destroyed through rigorous doses of chemotherapy and other drugs. They are left, in essence, without an immune system.
The transplanted marrow is infused intravenously, and the recipients wait anxiously for the next two to four weeks to learn if the marrow has engrafted itself into their bone cavities and begun producing healthy blood cells.
While they wait for the transplanted marrow to take effect, patients are extremely susceptible to infections that could quickly become life-threatening.
All the risk could pay off in a second chance at a healthy life. Finding a perfect match, however, can be difficult. In Branch’s case, her initial best shot was to receive marrow from her brother, but test results proved disappointing. Alice Kaplan of the Red Cross National Marrow Donor Program explained the odds of finding a match with one’s sibling are usually only one in four.
Like Branch, most people must turn to the National Bone Marrow Donor Registry to find a match. Kaplan says Branch’s best chance lies with a donor of the same race.
"You’re more likely to find a match if you have more people of the same race in the registry," Kaplan said. Even with the 5 million donors already in the worldwide registry, Kaplan says the Red Cross is in dire need of more African-American donors.
"I liken the registry to a lottery system. The more donors we have, the more likely it is that those in need of a transplant will hit this lottery," Kaplan said.
For now, Branch’s family is holding out hope that someone out there is holding the 15-year-old’s winning ticket to a happy and healthy life.
"We’re trying to be strong," Branch’s father said. "She was never sick as a child, you know? She always had so much energy … I just want her to be able to get up and go, like any other normal kid."
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If you are interested in becoming a bone marrow donor, call the Red Cross National Bone Marrow Donor Program at 215-451-4313.
