How a genetically compatible stem cell donor could be key to a Pennsylvania mother's future
MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Pa. (CBS) – Stem cell transplants used to treat certain kinds of cancer can depend on your ancestry. Ethnic groups have genetic similarities which increases the odds of finding a stem cell match. It's a connection a woman from Taiwan is hoping to find.
Vivian Cheng Larsen, 44, is grateful to be able to play with her 3-year-old son in Montgomery County while she's also receiving chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia.
"It was just out of the blue. I was a little tired, but I'm a full-time working mom with a toddler and I thought, oh, working full-time moms with the toddler are tired. So I didn't think anything of it," Larsen said.
Now it's always on her mind with her hair falling out and being bald.
"I was essentially planning for a life possibly without me in it," Larsen said. "It was really, really scary."
And now she has a new mission – to find a donor.
"It has to be someone else's stem cells that saves my life," Larsen said.
Larsen, who was born in Taiwan, has a better chance of finding a donor with the same ethnic background because there's a genetic component linked to a stem cell transplant that reboots the immune system.
"Your immune system has evolved based on your ancestry so odds are higher of finding a match within a group of people that share your ancestry," said Dr. Abeer Madbouly, who is the principal bioinformatics scientist at the NMDP, formerly known as the National Marrow Donor Program.
Madbouly is working with Larsen to find a suitable donor.
"So the diversity is really what makes our donors stand out," Madbouly said.
Experts say Larsen, like anyone in a minority group, has lower odds of finding a stem cell match.
"There's not enough donors of Asian descent, Asian ethnicity," Larsen said.
She's hoping to raise awareness that people can join the registry with a simple cheek swab and becoming a stem cell donor is essentially giving blood.
"There's a great need regardless of your background," Larsen said.
Larsen and her family are hoping a donor can be found to save her future.