A Second Chance at Life
By Gloria Romano-Barrera
“I started to notice bruises on my shin; I was
losing lip color and I was also very tired,”
shares Briana Donis of her initial symptoms.
“It was hard for me to work out and my headaches
were terrible. I finally talked to my grandma and I said
‘I think I have to go to the doctor to get checked out.’”
In addition to noticing petechiae (tiny, circular,
non-raised patches that appear on the skin or in a
mucous or serous membrane that occur as the
result of bleeding under the skin), she was losing her
life.
Initially diagnosed with anemia, Donis took iron
pills, however, after she did not get better, she
revisited the doctor. Soon after, doctors found
her blood levels were extremely low and they
rushed her to the hospital for an immediate blood
transfusion. It was there where she was diagnosed
with severe aplastic anemia.
Diagnosed with the blood disease at the age
of 18, it was during her senior year of high school
on March 14th, 2014 that she needed multiple
transfusions of hemoglobin and platelets to keep her
alive. Severe aplastic anemia (SAA) is a disease in
which the bone marrow does not make enough
blood cells for the body. Aplastic anemia can range
from mild to severe with bone marrow transplants
used in severe cases.
According to the Aplastic Anemia and MDS
International Foundation, between 600 and 900
people are diagnosed with aplastic anemia each year
in the U.S. It can strike people of any age, race or
gender, but it’s more common among children,
teenagers and older adults.
Donis received one ATG treatment and
when that did not work she had to proceed with
a blood stem cell transplant. She received her
first transplant at Texas Children’s Hospital in
December 2014, but it quickly failed. She faced
many complications until her next transplant
was scheduled.
“I had a really weak immune system and
they had to make my immune system even weaker,”
she shares. “They had to suppress it with
chemotherapy and radiation in order for me to able
to accept the donor cells.”
The non-profit donor organization Be
The Match is working hard to deliver a cure for blood
cancers and blood disorders. For patients with blood
cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, and other
life-threatening diseases, a cure exists.
Briana Donis.
Be The Match is a community of donors,
volunteers, health care professionals and
researchers who deliver cures by helping patients
get the life-saving blood stem cell transplant they
need. Their passion to save lives drives them to
help more patients survive each year.
According to Erica Sevilla, Be The Match
Registry® spokesperson, out of more than 20
million potential donors on the Be The Match
Registry only 7 percent are Hispanic. Hispanic
patients currently only have a 46 percent likelihood
of finding a perfectly matched donor, which means
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