Each year, approximately 18,000 people, ages 0-74, in the United States are diagnosed with life-threatening illnesses where a bone marrow or stem cell transplant is the best option for a cure. Unfortunately, many patients lose their lives because no matching donor is found.

There are currently over 9 million volunteer donors on the U.S. Be The Match stem cell registry, however the overwhelming majority of those registered are white. The chances of finding a matching donor within the existing registries are 79% for Caucasian patients, compared to 60% for Native Americans,48% for Hispanic/Latinos, 47% for Asian/Pacific Islanders and only 29% for African Americans.

Understanding that ethnicity is key to matching donors to patients, the Marrow Mates EFDS Program revolutionizes the donor recruitment process by targeting an individual patient’s own DNA relatives for virtual recruitment drives. These relatives are identified by enrolling the searching patient in commercially available genetic genealogy platforms such as 23andMe, Ancestry.com and My Heritage.

Where traditional registry drives involve physically setting up a booth at a college campus or community event and are limited to the ethnicity of the general population in attendance, EFDS targets outreach to the patient’s own ethnically similar genetic relatives, regardless of where those relatives are located.

Traditional registry drives are:

· Locally reaching, Generally targeted, Manually executed

Whereas the EFDS program is:

· Globally reaching, Genetically precise, Digitally executed

Marrow Mates provides EFDS services COMPLETELY FREE OF CHARGE to all patients, making the program fully accessible regardless of a patient’s income level. Funding for DNA kits and other program costs for the original pilot program originated 100% from private donations, but additional funding will now be needed for program expansion. Our administrative costs have historically remained less than 5% of total program expenses. This is accomplished by using experienced volunteers to conduct the virtual outreach effort. These volunteers are former transplant recipients, stem cell donors and patient caregivers.

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