NH couple appeals to Vermont Abenaki for life-saving marrow

Written by Contributor     

Wednesday, 14 November 2007

                                                Nicole Nelson with her husband, Richard, and her daughter, Katie.

CONCORD, NH: Growing up in northern New Hampshire, Nicole Nelson never thought to consider what her ethnic background was let alone how important it might one day become.

Today, as she struggles with severe aplastic anemia and seeks a life-saving bone marrow transplant, her recently discovered Abenaki heritage could be a key to saving her life.

The fact that her mother’s grandfather was an Abenaki in northern Vermont was completely unknown to Nelson until shortly after her Sept. 18 diagnosis with the rare, life-threatening disease that destroys the body’s ability to make enough new blood cells.

“I truly never thought, ‘what’s my background?’’ Nelson told the Courier on Sunday, Nov. 11, taking a break from celebrating her 35th birthday with her husband, Richard, and their 14-month-old daughter, Katie.

“She didn’t know I didn’t know,” Nelson said of her mother’s revelation about her Abenaki great-grandfather.

The information is important to finding a suitable donor because tissue traits are inherited, and because of the low number of potential matches for Nelson.

On average, patients diagnosed with aplastic anemia can live without a bone marrow transplant for up to 18-months, but Nelson has even these difficult odds stacked against her.

“They think it’ll be a long look, because I have such an uncommon type,” Nelson said.

When a patient’s tissue type is run through the national registry of 11 million potential donors, an average of 100 preliminary matches come back, but only five were found for Nelson. Four of these were from Japan, where a match is unlikely and results often take an extended amount of time.

The most likely bone marrow match would come from a family member, but Nelson’s family has already been ruled out. The next best hope for locating a donor is locating a person of the same race or ethnicity, which in her case is French and Abenaki.

The Nelsons have begun appealing to Vermont’s Abenaki community, through e-mails and telephone calls, to consider becoming individual donors or to help host a donor drive in the area.

Two donor drives in Nelson’s name have already been held in New Hampshire and six more are planned around the area for November and December.

Potential donors must be between 18 and 60 years old, but getting tested is as simple as a DNA test - just a quick swab on the cheek. If a potential match is found, volunteers are asked to take additional tests to refine results.

There are approximately 6,000 people on the national waiting list in need of life-saving bone marrow transplants.

“There are people from all walks of life that need transplants ... It’s one of those things where you can save a life ... and in a couple of days you’re back to your life,” said Nelson, who has worked as a physician’s assistant for the past seven years.

“That’s what’s so important, is getting people swabbed and in the system,” she said.

Whether a drive for Nelson is started in Vermont or not, she said it is important that minority people in particular become potential donors in the database, even if they do so as individuals.

“Minorities are actually the most under-represented of this pool of people,” Nelson said. Native Americans also have the lowest percentage of donors - about one percent, according to the National Marrow Donor Program.

If you are interested in scheduled drives, e-mail Richard at This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it

Those interested in helping organize a local drive in Nelson’s name should contact Nicole Rubeira, with the National Marrow Donor Program at the Rhode Island Blood Center, at 401-428-5720, or e-mail This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it

“Her company only needs a location, three-week notice, volunteers and food. They take care of the rest,” Richard wrote in an e-mail this week.

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