Wirral girl Candice Colley, 22, is facing a race against time to find a bone marrow donor to provide the lifesaving transplant she needs to beat leukaemia.Now Candice, her family and friends have organised an awareness day and recruitment event for people wishing to join the bone marrow register and they are urging local people to come along.
“Even if you aren’t a match for me, you could be the only person in the world who could save someone else’s life,” says Candice. “We want to make everyone aware of how vitally important it is to join the register and get as many people as possible signed up this weekend to save more lives.”
The Wirral Leukaemia Awareness Event takes place on Saturday 6 February at the West Kirby Concourse, Grange Road, West Kirby from 10am to 4pm. The Anthony Nolan Trust will be recruiting donors to its bone marrow register at the event; to join you need to be between 18 and 40 years of age and in good general health. Signing up is easy, you just need to complete a short medical questionnaire and give a small saliva sample.
Candice herself has been battling acute lymphoblastic leukaemia for two years and is currently undergoing gruelling chemotherapy. In her own words, “now I am at the stage where only a bone marrow donor will do.”
Her courageous campaign has already won massive support – her Facebook group has over 7000 members with messages coming in from all around the UK.
Karen Bonell, Donor Recruitment Manager for The Anthony Nolan Trust, explained, “70% of patients needing a transplant can’t find a compatible donor from within their families.Candice is one of them and is relying on the generosity of strangers to come forward and sign up to be a potential donor.Please come along to find out more - if you’re not a match for Candice, you could save the life of one of 16,000 other people in need of a transplant.”
