Welcome to DKMS Americas

Our First Blog

If you have stumbled across this section of our website you are probably wondering one of two things (or both)….who are these people and why do they have a blog?

Well allow me to introduce DKMS (and myself) to you.

DKMS or "Deutsche Knochenmarkspenderdatei" (German Bone Marrow Donor Center in English) was born in 1991 after Katharina Harf lost her mother, Mechtild, to leukemia. Katharina’s father, Peter Harf, and his family and friends worked tirelessly trying to find a life-saving match for her. Sadly, Katharina’s mother lost her battle, but continued fighting in her honor, so that one day all patients in need of a marrow transplant would have a fair chance of finding their life-saver. Katharina was only fourteen years old when she lost her mother.

In 2005, we expanded the DKMS mission to the United States, and since then, we have recruited and registered over 29,000 donors, and facilitated 35 donor and patient matches. But there is still much work to do. Last year, 35,000 cancer patients in the U.S. needed a marrow transplant. But only 3,700 received one. We have to make more matches happen. And, YOU can help us.

With the support of many of our friends, DKMS has been able to establish a donor recruitment program and national campaigns throughout the U.S. to raise awareness of leukemia and other blood cancers, important but often neglected diseases, and to increase the diversity of its donor registry.

That’s pretty much where I came in.

My name is Ellie Hernandez and I started working for DKMS in September 2006 where I stared as the Transport Coordinator, and then moved into Donor Recruitment and Internet Communications. I help to recruit the life-saving marrow donors needed to help populate the National Marrow Registry, so more patients with leukemia and other blood cancers can have a second chance at life.

The reasons we decided to have a blog were fairly simple.

~6, 000 people search for a transplant every day.
~Every five minutes someone is diagnosed with a blood cancer.
~Every ten minutes blood cancer takes a life.
~DKMS can connect a patient with their marrow match

This blog will share stories about patients and their donor drives. As well as any new and exciting news in the world of DKMS.