Jack Chin is dying of leukemia. He needs an immediate bone marrow transplant to survive. Here’s his story.
“You know what sucks? When you realize that most of your classmates from high school are doing things that they said they always wanted to do, and you are stuck looking at a wall full of pamphlets that say ‘Cancer and You’ and ‘Understanding Leukemia.’”
23-year-old Jack Chin has always been determined. Since he was in elementary school, all Jack wanted was to serve in the military for his country. West Point was the goal and sure enough, Jack made it happen despite a setback of being denied admission his senior year at Monta Vista High School. After studying at the University of California, Los Angeles for a year, Jack was admitted to West Point where he endured tough tests of his physical strength and courage—rappelling off cliffs, boxing against former infantryman and riding in tanks. After a year at West Point and a couple failed gymnastics classes (which he now laughs about), Jack decided to withdraw and return to UCLA, but not without a few powerful life lessons under his belt.
Jack with West Point alum.
Fast forward to summer 2011. With just one year left before graduation at UCLA, Jack was looking forward to a good summer. He had just secured a prestigious and very competitive finance internship at Visa in San Francisco. He had signed up for martial arts classes and was living at home for the summer in Cupertino before heading back to UCLA to finish up his degree studying Economics and Accounting.
But Jack had begun to feel some leg pain prior to the internship and hadn’t thought much of it. Not wanting to give a bad impression, he gritted his teeth and continued going to work on painkillers. But six weeks into the program, the pain was starting to take its toll—Jack could not move his legs or stand up. In July, he finally received MRI scans and a blood test. The diagnosis? Acute lymphoblastic leukemia. He was rushed to the hospital that same day where he stayed for a month.
After several months of treatment, pills and chemotherapy, Jack’s doctors have come to a disturbing conclusion: Jack needs a bone marrow transplant or he will die. His family’s bone marrow and even the bone marrow of his twin brother Jim have not been a match.
Friends and family have mobilized to plan bone marrow drives, with a focus on attracting people of Chinese descent as matches are more likely the closer the ethnicity. The odds of an unrelated person being a match for Jack are 1 in 20,000, but the hope is that with enough momentum, a match will be found.
A common misconception is that registering for the bone marrow registry involves giving blood. However, all it takes is a simple cheek swab and a quick form. Those interested in signing up can sign up to receive a free cheek swab kit in the mail at Be The Match join.bethematch.org/jack or by searching for local drives http://marrow.org/Join/Join_in_Person/Join_in_Person.aspx
Jack's family.
“Plain and simple, the only way Jack can find a match to save his life is if one appears in the bone marrow registry. There is no other way for him to get through this. No amount of positive, wishful thinking, encouraging Facebook notes, or sympathy will do anything to change the fact that if people don’t register, my brother is not going to make it,” Jim says. Jack hopes to finish his degree and apply to jobs doing consulting or financial analyst work. He has not given up on his dream of serving his country. Eventually, he would like to attend grad school and enter the FBI or foreign service.
Jack says, “The thing I remember most about West Point was that there was always someone there to help turn a bad moment into a funny memory, and no matter how bad it sucked, it would eventually come to pass. I never thought I would apply this to cancer, but I’m hoping it will be the same.”
Operation Save Jack Facts
• Jack needs a bone marrow transplant to survive.
• The chance of a completely unrelated person being a match is 1 in 20,000.
• Patients are most likely to find a match among donors with the most similar ethnic background. Hence, Jack’s most likely match will be Chinese.
• While white patients have an almost 90 percent chance of finding a match, the chance of a minority patient finding a match is only about 45 percent.
• On average, one in every 540 members of Be The Match Registry in the United States will be matched and go on to donate bone marrow or peripheral blood stem cells to a patient.
• A bone marrow transplant is a life-saving treatment for people with life-threatening diseases like blood cancers like leukemia and lymphoma, sickle cell, etc.
• Marrow donors are typically sought among family members first. But approximately 70 percent of patients needing a transplant do not have a family member who is a compatible donor.
• Many on the bone marrow registry can’t be located or will not donate when asked. According to the Institute for Justice, the percentages of donors who are available and willing are: 65 percent for Caucasians; 47 percent for Hispanics; 44 percent for Asians; 34 percent for African-Americans.
• Only about seven percent of those on the national bone marrow registry are Asian.
Getting on the registry and donating
• A common misconception is that registering for the bone marrow registry involves giving blood. However, all it takes is a simple cheek swab and a quick form.
• Registered donors must be between ages 18 and 60.
• Those interested in registering can request a free cheek swab kit in the mail at Be The Match (http://join.bethematch.org/jack). All you have to do is swab your cheek and mail the kit back to get on the registry.
• To look for a bone marrow drive near you to register in person and get on the registry faster, search here: http://marrow.org/Join/Join_in_Person/Join_in_Person.aspx.
• Thanks to advances in bone marrow, no surgery is necessary for donating. Donating bone marrow is much like donating blood. Blood is taken from the arm and the necessary bone marrow is immediately centrifuged out; the blood is then immediately sent back to the donor.
A video of the process can be found here:
How you can help Register. Start a bone marrow drive in your own community (http://www.aadp.org/hold-a-registration-drive/ )Spread the word. The more people we get to register, the better Jack’s chances of finding a match are.
