Blood Brother

Nearly seven years ago, Eric Williamson LGSOE’24 stopped at a table staffed by fellow Loyola University Chicago students who were looking for bone marrow donations—and because he did, a little girl in Brazil is in remission from leukemia today.

Williamson, then a senior at Loyola, wandered by a table for the “Delete Blood Cancer” campaign by DKMS, an international nonprofit dedicated to the fight against blood cancer and blood disorders. The promotional material characterized the chances of a bone marrow match as low, but noted that the potential impact on a recipient could be life-saving.

“I was curious, and after learning the risk on my part was very small, I felt there was no reason for me not to sign up,” recalled the Dallas native, now a doctoral student in the Measurement, Evaluation, Statistics, and Assessment department at the Lynch School of Education and Human Development.

Williamson agreed to a cheek swab, which resulted in the addition of his DNA into a worldwide registry—and so began the chain of events that would bring him into the lives of a young girl named Thaiza from São Paolo, and her parents.

Bone marrow is the soft, spongy tissue in most bones that produces white blood cells to fight infections; red blood cells to carry oxygen throughout the body; and platelets to stop bleeding. The transplanted marrow replaces tissue damaged or destroyed by disease, infection, or high-dose chemother- apy. According to DKMS, approximately 70 percent of all patients who need a bone marrow transplant must find a compatible donor outside of their family.

What were the chances that the tall male Texan would be a genetic match with a little Brazilian girl?

“The lion’s share of our genes are very similar or nearly identical between humans,” explained Boston College Biology Professor and Chair Welkin Johnson. Among the few exceptions are the human leukocyte antigens (HLA), which are proteins or markers on most cells in the body. The immune system uses HLA to recognize which cells belong in your body and which do not.

“Even siblings can have very different HLA genes, which is why the search for donors involves casting a very wide net to increase the chances of finding a match,” Johnson said. “A close HLA match— meaning that the donor’s and recipient’s tissues are more likely to be immunologically compatible—increases the chance that the patient’s body will accept donated cells as its own and not fight them.”

Following graduation from Loyola, Williamson joined AmeriCorps, the national voluntary civil service program, and moved to Boston to teach at a charter school. But in April 2015, he received a surprising message: His bone marrow matched a cancer patient in need of a transplant. Would he be willing to donate?