A POTENTIALLY life-saving bone marrow match has been found for Bengu Shail.
On Friday 22nd March, Bengu is underwent a possibly life saving bone marrow transplant.
Bengu’s family were overjoyed to hear that a young man has the bone marrow match that she so desperately needs. Bengu is suffering from Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia. Now, with the news of a bone marrow match for Bengu, the family have been given new hope.
Bengu’s bone marrow donor is a 36-year-old young man, who the family have hailed as their “hero”.
In November 2012, Bengu headed a huge campaign urging potential donors of Greek, Cypriot or Turkish origin to come forward and register. The response from the Community was tremendous, over 2000 people responded.
The Leukaemia Cancer Society has been working with the community to help raise awareness. It was hoped that by raising awareness of Bengbu’s condition, more and more people would donate blood and bone marrow and therefore the possibility of finding a match would increase.
The Following message was given by Bengu a few hours before her transplant.
“Hello everybody. It brings me so much pleasure to be able to tell you than in a few hours,I am about to have a bone marrow transplant! That’s right— I got a 90 percent tissue match and we are rolling. It’s been a little stressful knowing whether the donor would come round and I wanted to be certain it was quite literally in the bag before I told u all so please forgive me for going underground. But I can confirm a 36 year old man has just donated his cells this weekend to save my life and they are sitting in the freezer now at The Royal Free. I don’t know much more than that; but whoever he is, he obviously didn’t wake up randomly to do it. Someone or Something inspired this stranger to take out a few hours of his day to save my life. Maybe it was you? I can’t begin to describe how emotional I am to be here today after campaigning for so long. My donor has given me my dreams back and his has given me precious more time with my family. But without the monumental love, support and blood sweat and tears from so many people who have supported this appeal for so long, I never would have had the will or courage to get to this point. Words will never be able to describe how thankful I am that so many people around the world heard my story and wanted to make a change. It is YOU who kept me going and reminded me I had so much to do. As you can imagine, I’m very poorly at the moment and full of lots of drugs so i will take a while to respond to your beautiful messages. While we are celebrating at the hospital today, I know that there are another 30, 000 people in the UK praying to be in my position today and it breaks my heart. What made me a lucky one when so many others are in pain? Please, if you too want to make cancer a thing of the past, get on the register today whatever nationality you are. Tell your friends, organise an event at work or your local church, mosque etc. Go online and learn. Spit, swab or give a bit of blood. Do what u can because it’s easy, we all have a responsibility to protect our future generations and we can ALL make a difference. We now have three registers in the UK. All of these registers work together so do pick out the best for you. And lastly: please join me in raising a glass or (tea mug) for my donor and all the heroes who stood up and made themselves counted. It is in ordinary people walking the earth that we can find miracles. Love blessings to you all. Bengu x “
Like Bengu, there are many young people waiting for a lifesaving donor. Between the three registers in the UK, people aged 16 to 55 can now register, so we are urging our community to come forward, they could be possible lifesavers.
For further information and guidance please call the Leukaemia Cancer Society on 020 8374 4821 or call the Charity Co-ordinator, Androulla Stylianou direct on 07872633508
Email: [email protected] Website: www.leukaemiacancersociety.org
