Andalusia once again leads the way in bone marrow donation in Spain. The community celebrates World Bone Marrow Donor Day with figures that consolidate its leadership in this area at the national level. In absolute figures, it is the autonomous community that has contributed the most donors to the National Marrow Plan, with 23.6% of donors in the entire country.
So far this year there has been a total of 4,220 Andalusians registered in the Registry bone marrow donors (REDMO), 19% more than those recorded throughout 2023.
These are data which also show a significant rate of incorporation into this solidarity network, with 527 donors each month or 17 each day. Currently, there are a total of 118,349 registrants, which represents a 340% increase in donations since the creation of the National Marrow Plan by the National Transplantation Organization (ONT) in 2012.
These data show once again the solidarity of the Andalusians, and highlights the excellent work of professionals in blood transfusion centres in the activities of dissemination and promotion of donation, as well as in the registration and characterisation of donors.
By province, so far this year Almeria tops the list with 1,477 records, followed by Malaga (1043), Seville (561) and Granada (444). In Cadiz, a total of 183 people registered, in Cordoba 130 and in Jaén 76.
At present, The average age of registered Andalusians is 33 years. and half (49%) of the donors in the register are under 40 years old. However, only 36% of registered donors are men, compared to 64% women. This data contrasts with the fact that out of ten actual donors, seven are men, which highlights the importance of attracting male donors.
131 people have overcome the disease thanks to donors
The altruistic gesture of bone marrow donors has allowed a total of 131 people were able to overcome the disease in Andalusia during the year 2023 thanks to donations received through REDMO from Andalusian and Spanish donors or from other countries.
The increase in the efficiency of Andalusian donors is directly related to the increase in the number of people registered in REDMO and the qualitative improvement of the registry itself. In this sense, it is worth highlighting the effort made in recent years to improve the quality of HLA typing (immunological data of registered donors) at the CTTC in Malaga, which translates into a greater agility in research processes.
This type of graft has proven to be an effective therapeutic alternative for the treatment of leukemias, tumors and other hematological diseases, Hence the need to increase the number of donations to ensure that people who need a blood stem cell transplant from an unrelated donor have a better chance of getting one.
Last year’s activity data also highlight that bone marrow transplant activity from a The donation outside the family in Andalusia has continued to increase, with an increase of 22% in 2023 (last year 131 such transplants were performed), a result of the in-depth development of this therapeutic option and the inclusion of more and more voluntary donors in the Spanish Bone Marrow Donor Registry (REDMO).
In 93% of cases, a donor or a unit of blood is found. umbilical cord. If haploidentical transplantation with a 50% matched family donor is added to these options, all patients currently have a suitable donor.
Average search time drops to 28 days
In 2023, 231 new searches for non-family donors were activated for Andalusian patients. Over the last decade, the average time spent searching for a donor has been reduced very significantly and currently it is 28 days.
Regarding the origin of non-family donors, last year 28% came from the Spanish registry. This increase facilitates logistics and improves the sustainability of our system and is one of the keys that mark the National Bone Marrow Plan.
The REDMO network is a registry of voluntary bone marrow donors operating in Spain since 1991, managed by the Josep Carreras Foundation in coordination with the National Transplantation Organization (ONT) and the Autonomous Communities. It is connected to other international bone marrow donor registries to search for unrelated donors compatible with Spanish patients in need of a bone marrow transplant and to provide data on Spanish donors to patients in other countries. When a patient needs a bone marrow transplant, First, a compatible family member is searched for. If the patient does not have a compatible family member, a search for a compatible donor is launched via REDMO, both nationally and internationally.
This system ensures fairness among all waiting patients a transplant anywhere in the world, since when a donor’s data is registered in the Spanish Bone Marrow Registry, this data is automatically transferred to the Global Registration Network where it is available to any patient in the world who needs it. Therefore, there cannot be a donor for a specific patient and, therefore, from the Andalusian Health Service (SAS), we remind you that calls for donations for specific cases are not effective.
Most suitable profile
The age to register for the bone marrow donor registry is between 18 and 40 years old and preferably menThe reason is that this donor profile is linked to better clinical outcomes and is the most requested by transplant teams.
In Andalusia, the reference centers for becoming a bone marrow donor are the Centers of the Andalusian Network of Transfusion Medicine, Tissues and Cells and more specifically, the CTTC of Malaga HLA typing (immunological DNI) is performed on all bone marrow donors in Andalusia for subsequent registration at REDMO.
The efficiency of the Andalusian donor registry is increasing; at the beginning of the National Marrow Plan in 2012, there were only five effective annual donations in Andalusia, while last year there were 71, which means that 71 people were able to save their lives thanks to these Andalusian bone marrow donors, 35 in Spain and 36 others in different countries.
Bone marrow is not the only source of blood stem cells; they can also be obtained by umbilical cord blood. Andalusia has 21,075 units of umbilical cord blood (UCB), 34% of all stored in Spain (62,097) and the largest registry in Spain.
In 2023, 35 SCU units were sent for transplantation, four for domestic patients and 31 for foreigners. Over the years, the option of transplantation with SCU has been reduced due to the development of other types of transplantation.
Despite this, the Public Umbilical Cord Blood Bank of Andalusialocated in the Transfusion, Tissues and Cells Center of Malaga, has maintained the number of units distributed to national and international hospitals, 43% of all units distributed by Spanish banks, being the bank that distributes the most units, followed by Cordon de Catalunya bank.
