Bone Marrow Drive for Carmel Native
Moving away does not cut you from the ties of the community. A Carmel native is in trouble and the community is coming together to try to help.
Denise Cordovano-Kula is the daughter of Sal and Barbara Cordovano, former owners of the Balsamo-Cordovano Funeral Home in Carmel. She attended Saint James the Apostle School and is a 1992 graduate of Carmel High School. Cordovano-Kula, 38, is now married and the loving mother of two beautiful children, ages 7 and 9.
Cordovano-Kula was diagnosed with leukemia in 2009. She was treated and was in remission for three years and four months. Then it returned. Cordovano-Kula is in need of a bone marrow or stem cell transplant.
The Carmel community is coming together to host an emergency bone marrow screening at the Knights of Columbus, 10 Fair Street, Carmel on Sunday, March 3 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The test takes two minutes and involves a simple cotton swab.
“It is a DNA swab,” said Jonathan Garcia, who is organizing the drive. “You take a cotton swab and you wipe the upper portion of the cheek, the bottom portion of the cheek, left and right side and then they see if you are match from there.”
It will take a couple of weeks to find out the compatibility.
“We are looking for someone who is 100 percent compatible,” Garcia said.
Sal Cordovano is a 50 percent match. The use of his marrow with the stem cells of a frozen unbilical cord from a newborn that is a 50 percent match could be used.
“That is the Plan B,” Garcia said. “Our Plan A is to find someone who is a 100 percent match from this drive.”
Patients need donors who are a close genetic match, according to Delete Blood Cancer DKMS, which is the largest bone marrow donor center in the world. Unfortunately, six out of 10 patients never receive the lifesaving transplant they need.
The Delete Blood Cancer website notes, “70 percent of patients cannot find a matching donor within their family and depend on the national registry to find an unrelated bone marrow donor.”
The Cordovanos are hoping someone in Putnam might be a match.
If a match is found, a bone marrow transplant can occur.
According to the Delete Blood Cancer website, “Patients first undergo chemotherapy and sometimes radiation to destroy their diseased marrow. Then a donor’s healthy blood-forming stem cells are transfused directly into the patient’s bloodstream, where they can begin to function and multiply. For a patient’s body to accept these healthy cells, the patient needs a donor who is a close match.”
In order to qualify for the screening a person must be between the ages of 18 and 55. A parent cannot sign a waiver for a minor because marrow donation is a surgical procedure and the person undergoing the procedure must be legally able to give informed consent.
For any further information, please contact Jonathan W. Garcia at 646-525-9536 or via email at JonathanBCFH@gmail.com.
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.