Legion Post 24 launches bone marrow registration drive

This coming Saturday at the fourth annual Canton Heritage Festival, representatives from Canton’s Edward J. Beatty American Legion Post 24 will be on site at the Community Tent to remind visitors that “a lot of good starts with a little swab.”

Darren Bouwmeester with his late brother, Levy

Such is the message of the post’s newest community initiative — a bone marrow registration drive launched in partnership with the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) to help improve patient outcomes for those who have blood cancers and other life-threatening blood disorders.

The premise is simple: Beginning this weekend and continuing at the Canton Farmers Market and at other community events throughout the coming year, representatives from the Legion will be encouraging residents between the ages of 18 and 40 to swab their cheeks so their tissue type can be added to the bone marrow registry. The Legion will provide the swab kits and send in the samples, or residents can visit nmdp.org/get-involved/join-the-registry to request a free swab kit.

Once a person’s tissue type is added to the registry, they will then be eligible to donate stem cells or bone marrow if they are found to be a match. While it may take months or even years to be matched with a patient, donors are asked to keep their contact information up to date and to notify NMDP about any significant health changes.

“This is something that people can do and know that they made a meaningful difference in another person’s life,” said Darren Bouwmeester, a member of the Legion Post 24 Executive Board and organizer of the drive. “Even if they don’t know somebody personally who could be helped by a transplant, they know somebody who knows somebody.”

An Air Force veteran and a Canton resident, Bouwmeester said he only recently became involved with the American Legion, but when he first pitched the idea for a bone marrow drive at the Executive Board meeting this past January, his fellow board members were quick to embrace the idea.

“I’m really thankful for the support that I’ve received from my post,” he said. “They’ve entrusted me to spearhead this and I think they saw that this was something that’s very important to me.”

Having submitted his own swab years earlier, Bouwmeester said the importance of the bone marrow registry really hit home for him after his older brother, Levy, was diagnosed with leukemia, which is a cancer that affects the body’s blood-forming tissues.

Bouwmeester unfortunately was not a match, but thanks to another generous donor who was not related to the family, his brother was able to receive a stem cell transplant that helped to stave off his cancer. Eventually the cancer did return and affected his heart, and Levy passed away in 2023 following a cardiac arrest. But there were a number of good years in between that his brother got to enjoy because of the generosity of this one “total stranger.”

“We got eight more years with my brother thanks to this person, and that was priceless,” Bouwmeester said. “And I really believe that if more people knew that they could give up a half a day and maybe save someone’s life, they would absolutely do it.”

Bouwmeester noted that Carin Klipp, chaplain for Post 24 and a co-organizer of the drive, also has a sibling whose life was saved as a result of the bone marrow registry, and he is quite certain there are many more in Canton who could say the same thing.

“There’s a lot of division in our country and in our community, and people are frustrated,” he said. “I really feel like the way for us to move forward is to come together for events like these, and I do believe that when we gather together as a community, it reminds us that we have more in common than we have differences.”

Besides encouraging more people to donate, Bouwmeester hopes the Legion drive will help to educate the public about the bone marrow registry and dispel some of the common misconceptions associated with being a donor.

For instance, he noted that the large majority (approximately 90 percent) of donors are asked to provide stem cells collected from blood rather than bone marrow, and the process is similar to giving plasma or platelets. For the other 10 percent of donors who are asked to give stem cells through bone marrow, the process is more involved but is less painful than most probably think, according to the NMDP.

The marrow is removed while the person is under general anesthesia, and according to the NMDP, donors “experience no pain before or during the procedure but may feel sore or achy for a few days afterward.”

Bouwmeester also noted that all expenses are covered by the NMDP. “They pay for your travel and any lost wages. They’ll pay for your childcare, even for a pet to get boarded,” he said.

And while registration is limited to those ages 18-40, anyone who is already in the system are kept on the registry until age 61. There are also numerous other ways to support the registry, such as financial donations, volunteer work, and advocacy for patients. More details can be found at nmdp.org/get-involved.

As for the drive that’s being undertaken by Post 24, Bouwmeester said he does not have a specific number of donors in mind and is just happy to do his small part. “I’m really pleased that we could be one of the first groups in town to do a drive like this, and at the very least maybe we’ll raise some awareness about the registry and why it’s important,” he said. “At the end of the day, it’s such a small ask. And for me, this is one way that I can honor the memory of my brother while helping others at the same time.”

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Posted by Jay Turner on May 16 2025. Filed under Features. Both comments and pings are currently closed.