Question about Bone Marrow Donation - would it have to be done under GA?

[TotalChaos]

Am thinking of going on the register for this (am in a minority group). But have a phobia of GAs. Information I have read on the web is unclear as to whether if I were to be a match for anyone, the GA or non GA procedure would be used for extracting the bone marrow.

I'm pretty sure it is your choice. I am on the register and seem to remember reading that you are able to choose.

What I mean is you can either have it taken from your hip under Ga or through your arm over a number of sessions. Think it goes out of one arm and a machine takes the marrow some how. You also have a canula in the other arm as well.

thanks meg, what I read described that there were the 2 procedures as you mentioned, but not that you could choose which to have.

They had a programme about donating organs,blood and bone marrow a week or so ago on BBC1 and they also said that it was to donors choice on there. Good luck with it .

Totalchaos, it is great you are doing this. My dh (mixed heritage) is also on the register.

There are 2 ways of doing this, only one of which involves GA: read more

As mentioned in the link posted by blueshoes (thanks for that) only bone marrow donation requires GA, but this procedure is only used about 20% of the time these days. More often, peripheral blood stem cell (PBSC) donation is used, where the stem cells usually obtained from bone marrow are filtered out from the bloodstream instead. It's kind of like a 4-hour session of blood donation, where your blood runs out of one arm and through a machine that removes the stem cells and returns the rest of your blood to you through the other arm, in a continuous circuit. No anesthesia involved at all: you can be reading, watching a movie, whatever. Good for you for joining the registry... 13 million worldwide and counting!

Well done - what a great gift to give someone.

DH donated his bone marrow in March. He had hoped to do it by PBSC from his arm, but after a veinous examination found that the veins in his arms weren't good enough for that. In the end he did it by general anaethetic. He actually found the whole process a lot better than he thought he would, with no after-effects after a couple of days of stiffness and tiredness. He had never had a GA before and was pretty scared but the whol staf were brilliant with him - everyone loves a hero.

It is definitely worth going on the register, if you are picked (one in 1/2 million chance iirc) then if you then find you can't use the veinous method, you can re-assess and withdraw. ou never know, you might find that when faced with it, you can brave it out, I'm sure you would get ,loads of help.

Good luck with your decision.