White Plains and Valhalla region

Family CourtSports health club in Elmsford will hold a bone marrow drive on Thursday to bring awareness to one woman’s cross-country journey to educate potential donors.

The health club has sponsored part of Jeana Moore’s “Steps to Marrow,” a 15-month journey across the country to bring attention to the importance of joining the bone marrow donor registry.

Moore’s granddaughter, Jada Bascom, was born in 2007 with acute myeloid leukemia, or AML.  She underwent months of chemotherapy, but doctors eventually told her family she would need a bone marrow transplant to survive. The family could not find one possible match in the United States’ registry of 7 million donors.  By extending the search to an international databank with an additional 4 million, they found Torsten Huber in Germany as the only person in the world that was a match for Jada. The toddler, now 3, is in remission.

Moore started her walk on Oct. 19, 2009 from her hometown of Spokane, Washington, travelled to Los Angeles and on to New York City, making stops along the way at local bone marrow drives. She will walk the last three miles of her journey on Thursday from 110th Street and Central Park West to the Park Central Hotel at 870 Seventh Avenue in Manhattan were she will be welcomed by family, friends and supporters. Huber, the donor, will walk with Moore and meet baby Jada for the first time.

Family CourtSports, 150 Clearwater Road, will start the bone marrow drive on Thursday at 4 p.m. and host a Zumba fund raising event from 6:30 to 9 p.m. Tests during the bone marrow drive consists of the simply passing a cotton swab inside the cheek.

Key sponsors of Walk to Marrow are: Verizon Wireless, The Bone Marrow Foundation, Be The Match Foundation, DKMS, Park Central Hotel, New York Blood Services, Family CourtSports and The Jada Bascom Foundation.

For more information about the organization or to see Moore’s entire journey, visit www.stepstomarrow.com.  Additional information is available through the Jada Bascom Foundation, P.O. Box 1027, Deer Park, WA  99006 or 509-276-9663 or 206-450-5770.

Photo submitted by Family CourtSports

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