India has a high prevalence of blood cancer and other blood-related disorders like Thalassemia or A plastic Anemia. Despite many cases, patients suffering from such conditions are forced to struggle with their treatments and therapies. DKMS BMST Foundation India, a non-profit Organisation, is dedicated to the fight against blood cancer and other blood disorders, such as thalassemia and a plastic anemia. It is a joint venture of two reputed Non-profit Organizations: BMST (Bangalore Medical Services Trust) and DKMS, one of the world's largest international blood stem cell donor centers. Financial Express.com reached out to Patrick Paul, CEO, DKMS BMST Foundation India. He highlighted the status of blood disorders in India, challenges faced by the patients suffering from these diseases, and the role of DKMS BMST Foundation India in patient care in the country among others.
What are the challenges that a blood cancer patient faces in India? What needs to be done to help them in overcoming those hurdles?
Every 5 minutes someone in India is diagnosed with blood cancer or a blood disorder such as Thalassemia or Aplastic Anemia. Despite this huge cancer burden, In India, only 0.04% of the total population is registered as a potential blood stem cell donor. While blood cancer is life-threatening, a set of healthy blood stem cells from a matching donor can be life-saving. The demand and supply gap are increasing as people don’t register themselves as potential blood stem cell donors due to lack of awareness.
Only about 30% of the patients in need of a stem cell transplant as lifesaving treatment can find a sibling match. The rest 70% depend on finding a matching unrelated donor which makes it vital for people to register themselves as potential donors and help save a life.
How does DKMS BMST Foundation India help patients with blood cancer? In recent years, what are the crucial milestones that the organization has achieved in the country?
DKMS-BMST helps blood cancer patients by:
• Raising awareness and educating the general public about the importance of blood stem cell donation
• Recruiting donors, by encouraging people of diverse ethnicities to register as a potential blood stem cell donor. Recruitment is done through various registration drives at different colleges, corporates, and associations and through online portal.
• Matching and collection of stem cells by facilitating search requests in collaboration with transplant centers, collection, processing and transport of stem cell product
• Ensuring donor safety and following up post the procedure to monitor the well-being of the donors
• Supporting patients and families with information and organization of registration events
• Research to advance blood cancer treatment and improve the success rate of transplants
DKMS-BMST has organized over 1300 donor registration drives with focus on South India in the last one year across various organizations such as corporates, educational institutes, hospitals and defense forces to spread enroll more potential donors. So far, DKMS-BMST have successfully registered over 70,000 potential blood stem cell donors.
While our donor recruitment team is responsible to register potential donors, our medical team works with transplant centers and collection centers. As soon as we receive a direct request from a transplant center for a patient from India or abroad, a worldwide search is started to determine whether there is a donor available. If there is a donor from DKMS-BMST, we contact this donor and initiate all the steps for a successful blood stem cell donation. So far, we have arranged 29 successful donations and were thus able to offer 29 patients a second chance at life.
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