For those patients who have related fully HLA matched donors (apart from siblings), does the relationship with the donor influence the outcome? We observed that there was a significant difference in outcomes between those patients who received bone marrow from a fully matched father and those who received it from their mother.

Mr Chandrakanth Acharya is a voluntary blood donor and a donor motivator who is close to completing 100 donations with 32 single donor platelets donations and 1 stem cell donation.

Rakta Kranti – the Blood Revolution movement of Sankalp has a special program for school children aimed at sensitizing the young minds towards blood donation. The students of class VIII, IX and X are educated on various facts related to blood biology through their school curriculum, but they are unaware about the process of blood donation.

The following is the experience shared by a student volunteer from Ammucare charitable trust after the blood donation camp organised at Mantri Espana on 29th July 2017.

Whenever someone asks about the vision for our thalassemia centres – we mention we hope to close them one day! The intention behind the statement was to reach a point where every child who is likely to do better with the option of permanent cure gets transplanted and enough is done to prevent new births with thalassemia.

The second meeting of the Sankalp Cure2Children Network was held on 21-22 September 2017 at Ahmedabad.