PUNE, India, September 18, 2018 /PRNewswire/ --
It was a proud moment for DATRI, India's largest adult unrelated blood stem cell donors registry, as they facilitated their 100th donation for this year to mark World Marrow Donor Day 2018 (WMDD). Since 2009, the NGO has been relentlessly working towards saving lives of patients suffering from Blood Cancer and Thalassemia.
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Celebrating the spirit of selfless donors, various initiatives were undertaken to commemorate WMDD across India. Over 600 participants took part in a cycling event organised in Chennai, a running event was organised in Kolkata, while an interesting Radio program was curated along with a Donor in Vadodara. Special awareness sessions were organised for high school students in Surat and for a group of employees at the Fire Station, Trichy
Abhijit Govind Gore, a 42 year old donor registered with DATRI in November 2017. He expressed his happiness to donate on WMDD, "At the time of registration I never thought that I will get a chance to donate within one year, as I was aware that this is a one in a million opportunity. Today, I feel like I am chosen by the divine power to save a life. I feel blessed as I am not just the 100th donor for DATRI in 2018 but I also got the chance to donate on World Marrow Donor Day."
Speaking at the proud moment, Co-founder and CEO of DATRI, Raghu Rajagopal said, "We are happy to complete 100 donations on WMDD accounting to 434 donations in total. We have come a long way from the time we had challenges in counselling the first donor to becoming a team of dedicated professionals who work day and night to ensure that every match found in our registry goes on to gift a life to the needy."
In the last eight years, DATRI has worked towards spreading awareness on Blood Stem Donations through numerous camps held across colleges, educational institutions, corporates and residential areas. As a result there has been a considerable rise in the awareness levels among youngsters and professionals who have been great supporters.
Today, while DATRI alone has over 3,72,000 volunteer donors registered there is still a need to raise awareness on the importance of Blood Stem Cell Donation across masses. The only possibility of giving a new lease of life to people suffering from fatal blood disorders such as Leukemia, Thalassemia, Lymphoma etc. is to increase the number of donors so the chances of finding life-saving matches could increase.
There are around 1900 patients registered with DATRI who are waiting for an unrelated matched donor. A patient has only a 25% chance of finding a matched donor from within the family. With a 1 in 10000 to 1 in over a million chance of finding an unrelated HLA genetically matched donor, DATRI needs more volunteer donors to sign up with the registry.
About DATRI
DATRI is a not-for-profit organization co-founded by Mr Raghu Rajagopal, Dr Nezih Cereb and Dr Soo Young Yang in 2009. The organisation envisions to find a willing HLA matched donor for every patient in need of a blood stem cell transplant.
DATRI is India's largest adult unrelated blood stem cell donors registry with over 3,72,000 voluntary donors registered. DATRI has facilitated 434 donations till date.
DATRI is a member of World Marrow Donors Association (WMDA) and is listed in the global search program, Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide (BMDW).
To Register: http://datri.org/join
Media Contact:
Nancy Agnihotri
[email protected]
+91-9810768588
PR Coordinator
DATRI Blood Stem Cell Donors Registry
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