NOTTINGHAM

We are NOTTINGHAM MARROW - the student group that helps to save lives from leukaemia and severe blood disorders.

We work alongside the charity Anthony Nolan to help recruit people to the stem cell register, which links potential donors with people who desperately need a stem cell transplant. MARROW groups are working in 34 universities throughout the UK and in four other countries, but we want to continue to grow and expand. With more supporters like you, we can help save many more lives.

Please look around our website to learn more about us and what we do!

About MARROW logo_anthony_nolan

About MARROW

MARROW is the student branch of a parent charity - Anthony Nolan, which recruits potential donors to the national register, to match up to those who require lifesaving stem cell transplants. Watch the video HERE

What do we do?

We organise student recruitment events and fundraise for Anthony Nolan in and around Nottingham to increase the amount of available donors and raise the charitable funds essential for these lifesaving activities. Our ultimate aim is to allow every student at the University of Nottingham the opportunity to join the national register. This is particularly important as students are an ideal target group: they are generally young, healthy and represent a broad cross section of ethnicity.

The story so far...

We have been running in the UK since 1998. The project was initially set up by James Kustow and a group of student doctors from the University of Nottingham following the death of their friend Karen from leukaemia. Since then we have gone from strength to strength. Our work has been recognised by the World Health Organisations Federation for Medical Students, with MARROW taking first place awards for the last two years.

In 2010/11 we recruited in excess of 260 potential donors and raised over £1800!!!

This year our aim is to double these figures!

Still want to help but not living in/around Nottingham? Click here to view all UK MARROW groups!

Clinics

Signing up

To sign potential donors up to the register, MARROW holds regular recruitment events

all across campus and beyond!

At the events, we get each potential donor to read a booklet containing detailed information about the whole process from being put on the register to what to expect if they end up being a match and are asked to donate their bone marrow, and then ask them to fill in a medical questionnaire.

We then sit down with the potential donor to:

confirm their eligibility to sign up: see the Anthony Nolan exclusion criteria

check that they understand what they are signing up to

discuss the donation procedures should they be contacted to donate

answer any queries they might have: see the Anthony Nolan FAQs

Once the questionnaire has been completed and checked, a member of MARROW will then take a spit sample using our spit kits from the potential donor, which is then sent off to a laboratory where the donor's tissue type is determined and they are officially added to the Anthony Nolan national register/database.

To find out more about Anthony Nolan, find out if you are eligible to donate, or to sign-up to the register online please visit their website: www.anthonynolan.org

Get involved! Marrow campus 14

Get Involved!

Become a MARROW Volunteer!

At recruitment events - we train students how to: succesfully recruit eligible potential donors, counsel them to ensure that they are fully aware of the importance of their commitment and collect samples for genetic analysis, as well as informing those who are not eligible how else they can help.

Fundraising/Social - we hold regular events to raise funds for Anthony Nolan. Previous events include: cake sales, glow stick sales in OCEAN , raffles, pub quizzes, bag packing, street collections and much more! Our current fundraising success for 2011/2012 can be seen at our Just Giving page.

Publicity - we are always looking at ways to publicise MARROW to students in Nottingham, we need your help to spread the word about recruitment and fundraising events, as well as raising the profile of MARROW within the student community.

We also work in partnership with another group of students who organise the annual MARROW run (5 or 10km) and raise thousands of pounds for Anthony Nolan, for more information visit their website: www.nottinghammarrowrun.co.uk

Events

Donor recruitment events

We are very excited to announce a FULL DAY donor recruitment event!!

When? Thursday 16th February

9am - 5pm

Where? Trent Building, Uni. Park

This is your chance to volunteer, sign on to the stem cell register, or just to learn more about the wonderful work we do at MARROW - see you there!

Refresher training evening

We're really keen to make sure our wonderful volunteers are stay involved in the new year so we invite everyone (old and new) to attend our refresher training evening:

When? Thursday 9th February

6pm - 7pm

Where? LT3, Medical School

What? You'll have the chance to chat to other volunteers and the committee, practice counselling, have your questions answered and enjoy some FREE PIZZA too!