New York: As the founder of start-ups like Photojojo and Jelly, Amit Gupta, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, is experienced at bringing people together on the net.
Now, his friends are trying online and offline to bring people together for him.
The 32-year-old Indian-American was recently diagnosed with leukemia. Amit has about six weeks to get a bone marrow transplant, which could save his life. However, his South Asian ancestry means it's tough to find a match - of the nine million names in the National Bone Marrow registry in the US, only 160,000 are South Asian.
"So when Amit does a search he has a really small chance of finding someone who is going to match him. A Caucasian person on the other hand has a 93 % chance of finding a match," explains Tracy Julian, a spokesperson for the National Marrow Donor Program.
Determined to beat the odds, Amit's friends have started conducting donor drives across the US, spreading the word and urging South Asians to register on Twitter and Facebook. There is also a hashtag dialog on Twitter under the tag #iswabbedforamit.
"He is trying to keep his spirits up, he is frustrated that this is out of his hands. He has always been a very independent person. He set up his own company and business. And it is very difficult for him at this time to realize that he needs other people's help to survive" Amit's father told NDTV.
Amit is currently undergoing chemotherapy and has gone into remission but time is running out-a bone marrow transplant can only be done while a patient is in remission.
"Amit needs to find a match in six weeks and it takes about four weeks to screen the bone marrow matches alone so we are nervous and feeling a real sense of urgency here," says a former roommate, Aileen Nowlan, who helped organize a donor drive at the Yale Law school.
Registering as a stem cell donor is painless and free. There are no blood samples or injections required. A cotton swab of one's cheek cells takes a few seconds and is entirely painless.
Now, his friends are trying online and offline to bring people together for him.
The 32-year-old Indian-American was recently diagnosed with leukemia. Amit has about six weeks to get a bone marrow transplant, which could save his life. However, his South Asian ancestry means it's tough to find a match - of the nine million names in the National Bone Marrow registry in the US, only 160,000 are South Asian.
"So when Amit does a search he has a really small chance of finding someone who is going to match him. A Caucasian person on the other hand has a 93 % chance of finding a match," explains Tracy Julian, a spokesperson for the National Marrow Donor Program.
Determined to beat the odds, Amit's friends have started conducting donor drives across the US, spreading the word and urging South Asians to register on Twitter and Facebook. There is also a hashtag dialog on Twitter under the tag #iswabbedforamit.
"He is trying to keep his spirits up, he is frustrated that this is out of his hands. He has always been a very independent person. He set up his own company and business. And it is very difficult for him at this time to realize that he needs other people's help to survive" Amit's father told NDTV.
Amit is currently undergoing chemotherapy and has gone into remission but time is running out-a bone marrow transplant can only be done while a patient is in remission.
"Amit needs to find a match in six weeks and it takes about four weeks to screen the bone marrow matches alone so we are nervous and feeling a real sense of urgency here," says a former roommate, Aileen Nowlan, who helped organize a donor drive at the Yale Law school.
Registering as a stem cell donor is painless and free. There are no blood samples or injections required. A cotton swab of one's cheek cells takes a few seconds and is entirely painless.
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