For three Ohio University students, a five-minute stop to have their cheeks swabbed last year has become an opportunity to save lives.
Hillel at OU has swabbed students’ cheeks for four years to match donors with patients waiting in the Gift of Life donor registry. In the recent swabbing drive, three students from OU are perfect matches.
“We are thrilled,” said Rabbi Danielle Leshaw, executive director of Hillel at OU. “It is so exciting when students are selected to represent OU and make such an enormous impact on a family. It is part of the mission of Hillel to ensure our students are impacting the world and engaging in acts of justice.”
After Hillel collects the swabs, they are sent to the Gift of Life Foundation, an organization dedicated to bone marrow donations. While hundreds are considered as matches, three or four are selected as perfect matches, Leshaw said.
“OU has to be one of the most inspiring campuses I have ever worked with,” said Shayne Pilpel, lead recruitment coordinator at Gift of Life. “Leshaw really demonstrates her passion, and the way she motivates students makes it impossible for Hillel at OU not to be successful. Her passion is contagious.”
Of the more than 2,500 swabs OU sent to the organization, the names of the three matches are unavailable. OU officials do not know if the students have agreed to donate their bone marrow, although donation is a stipulation of being swabbed.
“We do have bragging rights,” Leshaw said. “We are the single best campus in the country for swabbing. We swab in ways that no other campus is capable. We have figured out the formula. We are working with Gift of Life so we can package the best practices for bone marrow swabbing.”
For some students, it is an opportunity to support a cause that has touched them personally. Bone marrow is donated to patients who are diagnosed with lymphoma, other cancers and genetic diseases.
For Lucy Edgell, a senior studying forensics chemistry and marine biology, participating in Hillel’s bone marrow drive was a way to indirectly support her boyfriend’s dad, diagnosed with leukemia.
“It is a way to help everybody without having to travel too far away,” Edgell said.
OU has the potential to reach thousands with its samples. Gift of Life has provided 8,239 bone marrow matches, according to its website.
However, with 13,171 donors on the wait list, the organization always needs more cotton swabs. Only about one percent of registered donors end up being able to donate bone marrow, according to the Gift of Life website.
“Reaching that college demographic is so important to our organization,” Pilpel said. “They are the healthiest, the youngest and will be in the system the longest.”
sj950610@ohiou.edu
