In part 3 of our 4-part series in honor of National Childhood Cancer month, Jessica Pasley tells her story about her family's need for a marrow transplant, and how you can save lives by being a donor.

What if you were given an opportunity to provide a life-saving treatment for one or even two people in the entire world? Would you do it?

The only cost would be time – the exact thing you would be able to provide to the patient or patients in need.

Right now, more than 6,000 men, women and children are searching the National Marrow Donor Registry (NMDP) in hopes of finding a donor to provide a "cure" for illnesses that can be treated by bone marrow or cord blood transplants (stem cell transplants). Despite a global registry of nearly 10 million people, still there are not enough choices for those in search of the perfect match.

For many patients, the quest for a second chance at life falls short. Successful transplants require that very specific tissue typing of both the patient and the donor match. Because of the intricacies of an individual's genetic makeup, the more volunteers who sign up to be donors, the better chance a patient has at finding a potential match.

As a parent of children who needed bone marrow transplants to survive, the search for donors was wrenching. Our children's lives were at stake and we were at the mercy of the public.

Although specialists were able to locate donors for each of our twin daughters, not everyone is so lucky. And even for our family, the end result for our first daughter, Jade, was not what we wished for. She died at the age of 2, a few months after her transplant when her cancer returned. But we are forever grateful to her donor and the hope the transplant offered us. It gave us six more months with our daughter and introduced us to a global issue - the dire need for donors.

Our second daughter, Jillian, 9, has had two transplants. Her donor was different from her sister's. Twice he has given her marrow. There are no words that can express how we feel because of this awesome gift – a second and third chance at life.

He works to recruit donors to the registry as well. He knows the difference it makes. The rewards for such gifts are endless.

Because of the critical shortage of donors, the NMDP has enlisted the help of communities worldwide in hopes of raising awareness specifically among minority populations. The donor registry desperately needs a more diverse group of applicants.

What would you do if you were told that there are no further treatment options available to help save your life except for a bone marrow transplant? Additionally a transplant would be difficult to secure because of a population that was either uneducated about the need for donors or one that was apathetic.

Could you make a difference?

Will you?

For more information concerning how you can help, facts about joining the NMDP and the details of bone marrow and cord blood transplantation go to Marrow.org.

About the Author:

Jessica Pasley and her husband Irvin live in Franklin , TN with their children Myles, 12 and Jillian, 9, and Angel Jade, forever 2, Shadow the dog and Spud the fish. They are the founders of the Jade E. Pasley Patient and Family Assistance Fund, lovingly called Jade's Fund. The fund was established in 2000 in memory of their daughter Jade Elizabeth and was created to help the families of children with cancer facing financial hardship due to their child’s illness.

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