Every 27 seconds, someone somewhere in the world is diagnosed with blood cancer. As blood cancer and the fight against it continue to evolve, so too must the organizations and individuals that are striving to support those impacted.
Katharina Harf
Chairman, DKMS Global
Anyone who has watched a loved one battle blood cancer knows the overwhelming feeling of helplessness that it brings. I was only 13 when my mother was diagnosed with leukemia, but I remember the surge of emotions — fear, sorrow, and a deep frustration that I could do nothing to save her. We quickly found out she would need a stem cell transplant to survive, but with no matches in the family, there seemed to be no hope.
My father, Peter, began recruiting family and friends to help register new donors across the country. In one year, we added 65,000 new donors to the registry. Sadly, my mother passed away from her disease in 1991, but before leaving us, she made my father promise that he would continue fighting until all patients could receive a second chance at life. By founding DKMS, an international non-profit organization dedicated to the fight against blood cancer, we have not stopped working toward that promise.
Over the past 33 years, as the fight against blood cancer has evolved, so has DKMS. We now embrace a 360° approach focused on the donor and patient journey, from the donor’s registration as a potential lifesaver and the patient’s search for a match to the process of stem cell collection and the actual transplantation. That is why we extended the scope of our activities to pursue a more holistic approach.
Holistic care and support
The heart of our activities remains the same as when we were founded — finding the right match for a patient and facilitating a stem cell transplant. This is the main focus of all of our donor centers, in seven countries across five continents, and it helps ensure we are creating a diverse donor pool that increases the chances of patients worldwide finding their genetic twin.
Still, registering new donors is not enough if we want to truly overcome blood cancer worldwide and offer solutions for all patients. In poorer regions of the world, basic medical care is simply not affordable, let alone chemotherapy or stem cell transplantation. This means we must focus on supporting international aid programs, contributing to the funding of transplantation for patients in need, building hospital units, training medical professionals, and organizing free family typings and confirmatory typings in low- and middle-income countries.
Finally, to fulfill our mission sustainably and ensure a better future for all patients, we are increasingly focusing on research and development, including advanced cell therapy, to be able to fight cancer from all angles. These efforts include investments in scientific studies and clinical trials to improve patient outcomes, as well as opening a new field of diagnostics to enhance blood cancer treatment.
Every 27 seconds, someone somewhere in the world is diagnosed with blood cancer. As blood cancer and the fight against it continue to evolve, so too must the organizations and individuals that are striving to support those impacted. By employing a more holistic approach, we will be able to best serve the needs of all patients.
