Asian American Donor Program

Asian American Donor Program

Mission Statement:

Asian American Donor Program (AADP) is dedicated to increasing the availability of potential stem cells donors for patients with life threatening diseases curable by a stem cell transplant.

Who we are:

(AADP) is a community non-profit (501c3) organization geared towards saving lives. We are an official recruitment group of the Be the Match Registry, formerly the National Marrow Donor Program, specialized in conducting outreach and donor registration drives in the Asian, Pacific Islander, and Multi-racial communities. AADP now outreaches to the entire ethnic minority community.

History:

In 1989, two Asian leukemia patients, Amanda Chiang, 9 months, and Judity Jang Berkoltz, 32, were in desperate need of bone marrow transplants. Both patients were unable to find a match within their own families. Turning to the National Marrow Donor Program® (NMDP) Registry, the patients hoped to find unrelated marrow donors. With only 123 Asian donors listed on the National Registry, they were told that the prospects of finding compatible donors were virtually impossible.

Determined family and friends of the two patients made a statewide appeal to recruit more Asians onto the Registry. Despite the tremendous emotional and financial sacrifice which led to the successful recruitment of more than 2,000 Asians, no matches were found. However, the unfortunate deaths of these two people gave birth to the compelling mission of the Asian American Donor Program (AADP) and the hope of new life to others.

The information above can be found on the official website of Asian American Donor Program. For more details about the organization and to find out how you can volunteer, please visit their website: http://www.aadp.org

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