Hundreds of students volunteered Monday to take swabs from inside their own mouths to enter into a national stem cell database, part of a Canada-wide effort going on at more than a dozen universities, including at uOttawa and Carleton.
The effort, called Get Swabbed, was held to add as many new potential blood stem cell donors as possible into the OneMatch Stem Cell and Marrow Network.
The project began last fall at McMaster University where student Dustin Shulman had read about the need for more stem cell donors. He held a 24-hour registry that brought in 754 new potential donors.
This year 15 more universities, including Queen's, are on board and holding their own clinics. The network hopes to add more younger donors to its registry since research shows patients can respond better to younger stem cells.
Similar events are also being held at McMaster, Carleton, Ottawa, Guelph, Toronto's Mississauga, Scarborough and St. George, Western, Windsor, Waterloo, Wilfred Laurier, Algoma, Alberta and Memorial universities.
There are currently 265,876 Canadians registered with OneMatch but nearly 800 patients are still seeking a stem cell donor.
Andrea Reichert, a fourth-year biology student, is heading up the Queen's effort. She is on the Queen's University blood team, which holds blood donor clinics on campus, and offered to run this first-ever stem cell donor clinic at the university.
She said the different universities involved across Canada and holding a friendly competition to see who can sign up the most potential donors.
"We are making announcements in classes and we've got posters up all over so hopefully it will be a good turnout today. This being our first event we are hoping to make it big."
She was hoping for at least 500 staff and students to drop by. Each volunteer takes four swabs from inside their cheeks. The swabs are then tested to see if the donors have the correct antigens to match up with a specific patient who needs stem cells.
"It's a very specific match so that's why we are trying to get so many volunteers here."
She explained people who are in need of stem cells include those who have undergone chemotherapy or radiation therapy because of cancer.
"This has killed most of their own stem cells. Without their stem cells they can't survive. So if they match up specifically with a healthy donor, then that donor can supply the patient with stem cells and then their body will regenerate their stem cells and get them up to a healthy level again. It really does save a person's life."
If the volunteer shows up as a match to a patient, they will be contacted to see if they are still willing to be a stem cell donor, said Reichert.
She said stem cells can be harvested from a living donor in one of two ways: directly from the bone marrow or from peripheral blood.
Stem cells taken from the bone marrow involves a general anaesthetic while the cells are removed directly from the marrow in the hipbone. If taken through the peripheral blood, the donor's blood is circulated through a machine that removes the stem cells before the blood is returned to the body.
"More commonly it is done through peripheral blood so it is less invasive a procedure."
Reichert is graduating but hopes the blood team volunteers who remain will hold the event each year from now on.
"Hopefully it will get bigger and bigger."
Ryan Aalders, a fourth-year biochemistry student at Queen's, was one of the first to volunteer for the swabs yesterday morning.
"You never know when someone is going to need a donor for something and I figured that, if I am in good health, then I might as well be contributing in some way. It's the least I can do."
He said he has had several family members suffer from cancer.
"If there is any way I can contribute to helping others and their family members in any way possible, even if it is just by having my blood marrow put in a database in case someone needs it, I figured I might as well do that. There's no harm."
If he were to get that call one day that his stem cells were needed he said he would be more than willing to undergo whatever procedure was required.
"I would do it. I don't see why I shouldn't, really. If someone needs it and I have something to give, why not give it?"
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