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A Genetics/medical Question?

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A year ago, my wife had major surgery. Before and during recuperation, they made all sorts of tests, and stored the data in the hospital’s, or some other, data bank.
We have now been contacted by the hospital, asking her if she would consider donating bone marrow to someone suffering from aplastic anemia (spelling?), who will die without it. I don’t know if is related to the fact that my wife has the rarest blood-type in the world, but a bit more common to her ethnic group.
So, my first question: What are the odds (for example, a million-to-one, or a thousand-to-one, or whatever) of two people being a perfect or suitable match for marrow-donation? I know that it is best between identical twins. Thanks!

3 Responses to “A Genetics/medical Question?”

  1. hot fix swarovski rhinestones says:
    November 4, 2009 at 9:59 pm

    A perfect match will never happen except with maternal twins, and we don’t even look for perfect matches. Rather, when screening potential donors, we look for the least incompatible donor. Blood type is only one consideration. More important, especially with marrow and tissues are the HLA types of the donor and recipient, because it is these proteins on the cell surface that are primarily responsible for graft rejection.

  2. mtwaites says:
    November 5, 2009 at 4:05 am

    It is very interesting, but there are sometimes when you will be asked from something like a hospital, or registry if you’re able to donate to someone. This is sometimes very hard thing to do, as the person has to have very similar blood, rh factor, and other thing. Usually before someone undergoes major surgery, they are cross matched and typed to a donor system, and that is how they would have gotten your name.

  3. sweetche says:
    November 5, 2009 at 10:15 am

    i think the odds were 10000 to 1 that 2 people will be compatible, and even smaller for a rare blood type, because you have to match in blood type, race, maybe even gender.