Queen Mary team delivers more hope

Waiting time for a bone marrow transplant is being cut to about five months from more than six now with additional facilities at Queen Mary Hospital.self storage The new-look Haematopoietic Stem Cell (Bone Marrow) Transplantation Centre can also handle 30 more patients with eight new wards. They add to 10 wards that treating 110 patients every year. Kwong Yok-lam, chief of Queen Mary's Division of Haemotology, pointed out that some people have worsened or died while awaiting transplants. ``For patients referred between January and July 2010, at least 20 percent of patients with donors deteriorated while waiting,'' Kwong said, and such strains and tragedies had continued since then. The situation changed with more bone marrow donors and expertise available, he said. ``But we did not have the beds. Now that more beds have been added we can help more people.'' Transplant capacity at Queen Mary was at saturation level迷你倉in 2002, Kwong said, so waiting time for bone marrow transplants had to be extended. After 2009, patients could be waiting for more than six months for a bone marrow transplant, but that has now been reduced by around a month. Those in need of a bone marrow transplant may also benefit from a refined procedure following advances in the field. ``In the past, people who needed a bone marrow transplant had to have two pairs of chromosomes fully matching those of a donor,'' Kwong said. ``It could extend the waiting time to find a suitable one. ``A transplant can now be done requiring only half of them matched. This can give options to high- risk patients when suitable donors cannot be identified within a time limit.'' Besides the increase in facilities being of immediate benefit to patients, Kwong added, the expansion will means more specialists can be trained in the treatment of blood cancers. HILARY WONG mini storage