JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. (Oct. 7, 2014) -- In the end, it all came down to a single stranger. When Judith Mang's eight-year-old son Lane needed a bone marrow transplant to rebuild his immune system and lower the chance his leukemia would return, only two potential donors were identified worldwide. After one donor dropped out, Judith and her family could only hope the final potential donor would work out.
The second match, who lived an ocean away, said yes.
"That was a relief that I can't describe," said Judith. "But still until the day they take his cells, you're scared."
The difficulty in finding a donor was one of the reasons that Judith and her husband, Sgt. 1st Class Aaron Mang, joined in Madigan Army Medical Center's bone marrow donation drive here Sept. 22 and 23, 2014. About 160 potential donors signed up with the C.W. Bill Young Department of Defense Marrow Donor Program, which feeds into the National Marrow Donor Program.
In fact, Lane was the inspiration for Madigan's drive. Sgt. Stephanie Smals, a licensed practical nurse, started putting it together after the Mangs recently moved here. Smals served with Aaron in Germany, where Lane was first diagnosed in 2011.
"I just couldn't imagine what they're going through... I just imagined how it must feel to have a child who's going through that and having to depend on other people to help your child," said Smals. According to the DoD Marrow Donor Program, more than 70 percent of patients can't find a bone marrow match within their families. The larger and more diverse the bone marrow registry is, the better chance patients have of finding matches and getting help with illnesses such as leukemia, lymphoma, and aplastic anemia.
"It can happen to anybody," said Smals.
When it happened to Lane, the symptoms came on suddenly. Just three or four days before he was diagnosed, his appetite decreased and he displayed flu-like symptoms; earlier bruises on his legs went unremarked on because he was an active kid, said Judith. When back pain set in and his throat swelled, though, she took him to the emergency room.
Lane's white blood cell count was so extreme at 160,000 (normal counts top out around 10,000), that doctors checked his blood multiple times.
"You could tell by the look on their faces that something was wrong, and they pretty much told me right away he has leukemia," said Judith. Aaron came home early from Afghanistan, and Lane was immediately transferred to a German university hospital where they started treatment with cortisone and chemotherapy. His white blood cell count still skyrocketed to 400,000, requiring a third round of chemotherapy.
Because of the aggressiveness of Lane's cancer the Mangs were told right away that he would need a bone marrow transplant, which took place six months after his diagnosis. In the meantime, the Mangs found themselves constantly in and out of the hospital due to Lane's weakened immune system; a fever alone could send him back for days at a time.
Lane knew how close he was to not surviving. In a children's oncology department where many of his fellow patients passed away, the realities of cancer were ever-present.
One day he said, "Dad, I wasn't sure I was going to make it."
"It's a pretty tough thing to have to live with when your 8-year-old son tells you that," Aaron said.
Lane did make it, though, and later underwent additional chemotherapy and radiation treatment to prepare his body for the bone marrow donation, which he received in February 2012. After two doses of his donor's stem cells, Lane started developing new white blood cells.
"It was an amazing process," said Aaron. "We were very fortunate."
Even with the transplant, though, Lane is still at increased risk of getting the leukemia back for the first five years, said Judith. The hospital is storing additional stem cells from the same donor in case he needs another transplant in the future.
But for now Lane is focusing on being a normal kid again -- going to school and playing soccer. "It's a miracle," Judith said.
The Mangs emphasized what a large impact the donor had on Lane's health.
"It's quite possible he saved his life," Judith said.
They encourage people to register and yet caution them to truly be willing to donate before signing up.
"If you do it, be sure you really want to follow through with it," Judith said.
Aaron's message to potential donors is simpler still.
"Children are depending on you to save their life-- that's it. They're depending on you to send your cells to save their life," he said.
DoD service members, military dependents and Army civilians can register through the C.W. Bill Young Department of Defense Marrow Donor Program at www.salutetolife.org.
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