Porter To Host Annual Bone Marrow Donor Drive

   In conjunction with National Hospital Week activities this year, Porter Hospital will host the 3rd annual “Marrow Donor Drive” on Wednesday, May 12th from 11:00 a.m.—3:00 p.m. outside of the hospital cafeteria.  One year ago, 25 Porter Hospital employees registered as prospective bone marrow donors during our event, and this year we hope to surpass that number by inviting members of our community to come and learn more about this special opportunity to potentially make a tremendous difference in another person’s life.

    Representatives from the Rutland Regional Medical Center (RRMC) Marrow donor program will once again be available to provide information, answer questions and enroll interested people into the program.  RRMC is the only New England Hospital that offers a program of regular off-site bone marrow donation registration drives, which involves no cost to the donor or the host site.  Kerry Ellis, Marrow Donor Program Coordinator, contacted Porter last year to explore whether or not there would be any interest in having a drive in Middlebury, and Porter agreed to be a host site.  The "donation" process is a very quick and simple one that takes only a few minutes and is completely non-invasive.

    “This is a very good program and a great opportunity for our employees and community members to learn more about this project and, if interested, register to be a marrow donor with the national  registry,” said PMC spokesperson Ron Hallman.  “We were gratified at our results last year and hope that by having this event outside of the cafeteria during our annual National Hospital Week employee barbecue, we will have many more people stop by to check out this program.”

    Every year, more than 30,000 children and adults in the U.S. are diagnosed with life threatening blood diseases such as leukemia.  For many of these patients, a marrow transplant is the only chance for a cure.  At any given time, there is an average of 5,000 patients searching the National Marrow Donor Program Registry.

   According to Ellis, adding new donors gives hope to these thousands of patients who are searching this registry.

    For more information about this program, contact the Porter Public Relations Office at 388-4744 or Kerry Ellis at Rutland Regional Medical Center at 802-747-
6267.