PRAYERS FOR THE PERFECT MATCH

These South African families are living in hope that donors are found for their children who desperately need bone-marrow transplants

- SIPHOKAZI ZAMA

HE’S only four months old but he has already endured more medical procedures than most people are subjected to in a lifetime. Bone-marrow extractions, blood and platelet transfusions, two aggressive rounds of chemotherapy – little Rayaan Madhav of Norwood, Johannesburg, has been through it all.

The little boy was diagnosed at eight weeks with acute myeloid leukaemia, a form of blood and bone-marrow cancer, and his illness is consuming his mom Arlene’s life.

Her son has spent most of his short life in hospital and on days he is well enough to be home he can’t even be outdoors because his immune system has been compromised by the chemotherapy.

“We’ve been confined to isolation for months on end,” Arlene tells YOU. “But Ray is a fighter with a strong will to live and this gives us hope.”

The baby’s main hope is a bone-marrow transplant. He’s on the list at DKMS Africa, the bone marrow registry formerly known as The Sunflower Fund. The organisation is affiliated to the Deutsche Knochenmarkspenderdatei, or German Bone Marrow Donor File, an international organisation that also has bases in Poland, the US, the UK, Chile and India.

Registered bone-marrow donors’ samples are processed through the centre and potential matches are made with patients in need. For Ray, the search continues.

Arlene and her husband, Mish, have three other children who’ve been tested as potential donors but aren’t suitable – and complicating matters for the baby is the fact that the bone-marrow registry in South Africa is desperately in need of people of colour to donate.

Ethnicity is a major factor. Patients have a better chance of finding a match among donors of the same ethnicity.