A Hard Bargain: Here Today, Gone to Marrow

Two weeks ago, UC Berkeley senior Ed Martinez went to the doctor, filled out consent forms and got a shot.

Unlike most visits, however, Martinez left with $200, leaving the Alta Bates Comprehensive Cancer Center 50 cubic centimeters of his bone marrow.

Martinez is one of many college students involved in a lucrative local venture: donating bone marrow and white blood cells to be used for cancer research and getting paid handsomely for it.

At Alta Bates, the city's only donation center, donating 100 cubic centimeters of bone marrow pays about $450, student donors said. Medical administrators generally withdraw marrow with a five-inch needle attached to a syringe.

White blood cells can be donated in a single four-to-six-hour visit paying $350 or through a three-to-four day procedure paying $750, the latter of which uses daily injections to raise donors' cell counts, said senior Michael Weber, who has been donating bone marrow for three years.

"Getting the injections is pretty crazy and I feel a little sick and achy for several days afterward," he said. "But once I go pick up the check, I feel a lot better."

Donors giving white blood cells are hooked up to two IVs as blood is withdrawn and white blood cells are separated from other blood content, said Lindsay Palomino, charge nurse for Alta Bates' apheresis department, which is responsible for administering blood donations.

The center's donor list is composed almost exclusively of UC Berkeley students who learn of the program by word of mouth and advertisements, Palomino said.

"We don't like to advertise too much toward the general population because we get people who are really hard-up for money," she said.

Unlike marrow and white blood cell donation centers, other organizations do not offer compensation in order to avoid attracting unqualified donors.

"We don't want to jeopardize the safety of the blood supply by encouraging donations for financial gain," said Sara O'Brien, a spokesperson for the Northern California American Red Cross Blood Services.

Palomino said the health risks and long-term health repercussions of donating marrow or white blood cells are minimal. The center allows individuals to give 100 cubic centimeters of marrow every six months. Donors can give white blood cells eight times in their lifetime and six times if using the injection process, Palomino said.

All white blood cells and marrow donations made at the Alta Bates center are then sent to All Cell, a Berkeley distribution company that fills orders for marrow or cells from large national research firms and universities.

Because of difficulties finding matches for marrow and blood type, donations at the center go exclusively toward research and not to patients in need of transfusions, Palomino said.

Students, drawn by the promise of a fast procedure and faster cash, are eager donors.

"The procedure is pretty safe and easy, and it's quick money," Weber said. "I don't tell my parents because they would just give me the money."

Palomino said the payment is not the only benefit of the donor program, and that the donated cells could contribute to life-saving research.

"We don't want to advertise this program as someone's means for economic salvation," she said. "It's important because it provides cells that are going to help fight the battle."

Students said they recognized the good their donations do, although many still cite the monetary compensation as their main motivation.

"I have something useful that will quickly regenerate, and it can be used to help people," Martinez said. "If I can help expedite better cancer treatments by supplying research samples, then I see no reason not to."

Tags: