Captain donates marrow to save life

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Melanie Streeter
  • Air Force Print News
WASHINGTON --  When Capt. Brent Davis agreed to help drum up support for a bone marrow donor drive, he had no idea that 18 months and 1.5 liters of bone marrow later his actions may have saved a young man’s life.

The journey began when a fellow officer contacted Captain Davis, 910th Airlift Wing public affairs chief at Youngstown Air Reserve Station, Ohio, while trying to raise enough interest to sponsor a visit by representatives from the C. W. Bill Young Department of Defense Marrow Donor Program.

“As I heard about the program it sounded great to be able to save somebody’s life,” Captain Davis said. “I understood how significant that was. But it sounded really painful.

“In the back of my mind I was thinking, ‘You know, I probably won’t be doing this,’” he said. “I can contribute in my own way by putting it in the magazine and trying to make things happen.”

Captain Davis ran an intensive campaign to get the Youngstown ARS populace interested in marrow donation. That campaign was successful, and when the recruitment team visited the base, he registered with the Department of Defense and National Marrow Donor Program Registry.

Months slipped by, the seasons changed, and life went on as usual, until one day in September when a phone call informed the captain he was a possible match.

“It was the last thing I ever expected,” Captain Davis said. “I thought, ‘Well, I won’t be a perfect match, so I’ll just go along with it and see where it goes.’”

Jemila Early, senior donor service coordinator with the C.W. Bill Young donor center, guided Captain Davis from the initial phone call through months of preparation and finally to the donation center.

“I inform potential donors of their status, then hold an information session to let them know what they can expect,” Ms. Early said. “I also coordinate all the activities involved, including travel, medical appointments and evaluating lab tests to send on to Georgetown University.”

Another important role Ms. Early plays is making sure to best meet the needs of both the donation center and the donor.

“It’s certainly rewarding to work with military members,” Ms. Early said. “A lot of donors are so selfless, giving so much of their time under whatever circumstances.”

The donor center in Kensington, Md., was established by the DOD, and supports active-duty servicemembers and their families, DOD civilians, reservists, guardsmen and Coast Guardsmen who are eligible to donate.

“They said, if I got a call back, it meant there was a 10-percent chance that I would be a perfect match,” Captain Davis said. “I played along and kept cooperating, but still thought it wouldn’t go much further.”

But it did. Captain Davis was the perfect donor for a 17-year-old boy with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a type of cancer that affects the body’s lymphatic system.

“When they told me that the recipient is a 17-year-old boy, that hit home,” Captain Davis said. “Being a parent myself, there was no way I could not do it. The thought that I could help save his life and give him a full life … I thought wow, that’s worth temporary pain to help him out.”

In fact, Captain Davis was so eager to help the young man he forged ahead without really going over his plans with his wife, Sonya.

“I get a little wound up about things sometimes,” Captain Davis said. “I tend to not really do things properly, so without tactfully running it by her, I decided this was what I was going to do. I didn’t really take her feelings into consideration.

“I just didn’t think of the risk,” he said. “I had to make that right with her.”

This time, Mrs. Davis let the oversight slide.

“It’s a great thing to help somebody out,” she said. “Especially in this capacity, giving up something of yourself. I know it will work out.”

Captain Davis said his wife was very supportive when he finally told her about his decision.

“She’s got tremendous faith,” he said. “She just figures this has to be from God, because what is the likelihood of this, to be a perfect match?”

Even with the deck stacked in favor of both the donor and recipient, there were a lot of bridges to cross before the trip to Georgetown. Captain Davis suffered through weeks of paperwork and other hassles.

“I was being inconvenienced a lot,” he said. “I guess when you get so wrapped up in the bureaucracy of (the process), it frustrates you, makes you not even want to do it. And it takes you away from the reality of what’s going on with this kid.

“It’s very easy to look just at your side of it,” Captain Davis said. “You’re not even thinking of what’s going on with this other person, the other side of things.”

But as the date of the procedure neared, the big picture came into focus.

“All of a sudden, it came into perspective,” Captain Davis said. “I couldn’t help but sit and wonder what this kid was doing the week approaching, or how his family was doing. Were they crying? Were they confident? What’s going on with them?

“So it’s like this shift. You go from all this annoying frustration of inconvenience to thinking, as you get closer, this kid is going to die if I don’t do something,” Captain Davis said.

Captain Davis’ determination to follow through and finish the donor process was pivotal. In the weeks leading up to the procedure, the marrow recipient undergoes intense chemotherapy or radiation treatments to stop the progress of cancer. Those treatments destroy bone marrow, which produces red blood cells.

If Captain Davis were to back out at the last minute, the 17-year-old on the other end of the process would have no bone marrow at all -- no way to manufacture those essential, life-sustaining cells.

Captain Davis entered Georgetown University Hospital early Dec. 8 to take the final step.

Dr. Tamarro Taylor, an assistant professor of medicine at Georgetown University, performed the procedure to harvest bone marrow from Captain Davis’ pelvic bone. Like the thousands of other collections she has performed in the last 10 years, Taylor used a special needle and syringe to draw out the marrow.

“I feel very fortunate and blessed to have a small part in helping people on both sides of (the process),” Dr. Taylor said. “Every day something really nice comes about because of meeting all these people and treating people who have undergone transplantation. It’s a very, very special bond.”

Later in the day, Captain Davis emerged from the procedure, spent some time in the hospital’s recovery room while his anesthesia wore off and rested overnight in the hospital to make sure he would not suffer from complications.

Discharged from the hospital, and resting in his hotel room the next day, Captain Davis said he felt fairly well.

“I’m achy, but it’s a very tolerable pain,” he said. “I just can’t help but wonder how it’s going for this young man.

“Everything I’ve done up to this point … that’s just my story,” he said. “You’ve got this other, unknown story, this young man and what’s going on with him. I wish I could know right now. I wish I could get on the phone and talk with his mom.”

The opportunity for a meeting, though, will have to wait. According to donor program policy, Captain Davis and the recipient cannot request to know who was on the other side of the procedure until one year passes.

“If I had the chance to talk to him I would just say, to be able to give this marrow is just absolutely nothing compared to what he’s going through, and my heart is out to him,” Captain Davis said. “I just want him to know he’s in my prayers, and I feel that he is so courageous. It’s truly an honor that I’ll cherish for the rest of my life.”

In the meantime, Captain Davis did meet someone else who is very important to the donor program. While waiting for his flight from Washington to Youngstown, he and a friend struck up a conversation with a woman who asked whether or not Captain Davis was wounded overseas.

“I told her, no, I had just donated bone marrow the day before,” the captain said.

The woman’s face lit up as she pulled her husband’s business card from her wallet. She was Beverly Young, wife of Florida Congressman C.W. Bill Young, for whom the DOD program was named.

Mrs. Young sat down for a meal with Captain Davis, and called her husband so the two men could talk. Captain Davis said the congressman was very excited to speak with him. When Mrs. Young and the captain parted ways, she promised he would hear from her again.

Captain Davis is back to work now, having come so far since the day he agreed to help raise support for a program he knew little about. Not a day goes by without him thinking about the young man who needed an Air Force captain’s bone marrow to fight for a long and full life.