Using stem cells, woman joins brothers cancer fight

GOLTRY, Okla. Armed with stem cells, a Goltry area woman will be heading to Milwaukee next week to join in her brothers cancer fight.

Jeni Sumner was the only match among family members tested to donate stem cells to her younger brother, Ed Dee.

To me, Ive been given a gift. I know everybodys congratulating me and saying its a wonderful thing, and not taking it away from that, but I think Ive been given just a tremendous gift, Sumner said.

Along with helping her brother, Sumner is trying to encourage others to join the bone marrow donor registry.

I think a lot of people are afraid to join because they might get called, because they dont know what its like to be a donor, she said. I want more people to become aware of what its actually like to be a donor.

Sumner set up a Facebook page It Doesnt Hurt - To Save a Life to chronicle everything she will go through, as a donor, during the procedure.

Its an unknown for me, but its nothing compared to what my brothers going through, she said. I know the feeling that I got when I got the call from the doctor saying that I was his donor. The relief and the joy that I felt that our family doesnt have to look anymore. If anything happens, were covered because we have a donor, we have a match. The feeling that I got was incredible, she said.

Dee, of Milwaukee, Wis., was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia last year. Sumner said he went into remission last October.

Unfortunately, the cancer came back. This type of leukemia is a very dangerous and aggressive form. He, every couple of weeks, would go in for a blood test and this March he was informed that his leukemia had come back, she said. His doctors feel that a stem cell transplant would be the best for him, at this time.

Following the return of the cancer, Dee went through five days of rigorous chemotherapy to put him back into remission. He recently finished a lower dose session of chemo, Sumner said.

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Using stem cells, woman joins brothers cancer fight