Reviving hopes for leukemia patients

KOCHI: When it comes to dealing with cancer, every effort or assistance counts, especially in the case of children suffering from leukaemia. According to experts, many kids suffering from this disease can be cured if they get an infusion of blood stem cells. However, one thing stands between their hopes for a complete cure - lack of donors.

According to Rameez Rehman, a PhD student at Cusat's Women's Study Centre (WSC), at present around 10 children between the age group of four months to seven years are awaiting donors. "Some of these kids have been undergoing blood transfusions for the past four years. The wait is long and the money spent on the treatment increases exponentially. Blood stem cell infusion is the only hope for them," he said.

As a part of its charity initiative, WSC and the Department of Computer Applications on Tuesday organised an event, 'Revive', with the aim to generate funds to finance the Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) test. "The HLA test determines whether a person is compatible with the recipient. The patients who are already burdened with the treatment costs would find it difficult to cough up money to carry out the tests at private hospitals. So we decided to help them out," said Rameez.

On January 22, WSC had organised an event called 'Represent'. "It was organised to make people aware of the importance of donating blood stem cells, and around 700 students registered. The event was carried out in association with DATRI, the national registry of blood stem cell donors," he said. It takes around two months to get the results, he said.

However, the patients are desperate, he added. "The father of a four-month-old child contacted us and pleaded to speed up the process. So, we decided to carry out a fund-raising drive. We aim to collect around Rs 30,000 from 'Revive'," he said. 

"'Revive' was designed to have three workshops. The first one was martial arts for self-defence, then came glass painting and finally learning the basics of photography. The registration fee for the events was Rs 200 and the money thus collected will be used to carry out the HLA tests. We had healthy participation. Since it was for charity, many students paid the registration fee even though they couldn't attend the programme," he said.

According to him, DATRI used to do the tests free of cost, but they have now introduced a fee of Rs 1,800 per test, to cover the laboratory costs. "If a person goes outside for the test, he or she will be charged Rs 18,000. We are planning many more programmes," he said.