A special Thanksgiving for a bone marrow donor, a cancer survivor … and the Hutchinson Center

By Justin Matlick, Hutchinson Center science writer

A few years ago, Joanne Wilkie might have thought you were crazy if you told her she’d spend this Thanksgiving traveling from her native Scotland to a small city in the Eastern Washington desert. She would have found it even stranger to hear that her bone marrow cells got there six years before she did.

In 2005, Wilkie had some of her bone marrow extracted in a London hospital to help Ryan Kilbury—a man she’d never met who was being treated by Hutchinson Center doctors—in his fight against myelodysplastic syndrome. Wilkie’s cells were flown here to Seattle, where they were transplanted into Kilbury as part of a therapy that cured his disease. Now, Kilbury lives in Pasco, Wash., the father of three children who came far too close to losing their dad.

This year, the Kilbury family invited Wilkie to join them for Thanksgiving, giving them the chance to finally express their gratitude in person. As part of the visit, they toured the Hutchinson Center and met the doctors and researchers who delivered Kilbury’s lifesaving treatment.

To Wilkie, donating her cells was a no-brainer. She’s a firefighter who makes helping other people her personal mission.

“In my line of work, I save lives—it’s what I love to do—and this was just something else I could do to help someone,” she told a British newspaper.

Wilkie’s words—and her willingness to translate them into action—are a reminder of how progress against cancer relies on something more fundamental than research. It relies on the part of the human spirit that drives us to help others in need.

This Thanksgiving, we’re grateful to everyone who has harnessed this spirit to help push our mission forward. The research that enabled therapies like the one that saved Ryan Kilbury would not have been possible without the participation of clinical trial participants, bone marrow donors, financial supporters and all the other people who make up our community. The Hutchinson Center thanks you all.