GREENVILLE, Texas — As the director of a funeral home in Greenville, Texas, saving lives isn't necessarily in Brittany Sims' job description. But a selfless donation to an international registry just might change that.
"You put others before yourself," she said of the Coker-Mathews Funeral home.
Sims is the third generation of her family to work there.
"So, that's what we do," she said. "I come from a very service-oriented family and you just give back and you help others where you can, when you can."
Three years ago, Sims found another way to help. She heard about a company called DKMS, a company founded in Germany in 1991, that enlists potential donors to join national and international bone marrow and stem cell registries to help people fighting blood cancers. Peter Harf initially started the company in search of a stem cell match for his wife after a leukemia diagnosis.
The registry now includes the United States, the United Kingdom, India, and several other countries. The screening process is simple: cotton swabs rubbed on the inside of the mouth and then processed by DKMS for potential matches to patients in need of a donor.
"I was like, I'll register. I probably won't match anybody, but I'll register," said Sims of the sample she submitted in 2017.
"It's a couple of seconds and you mail it off and it's life-changing for somebody, so I encourage everybody to swab," she said.
She got the call in May of this year. She was an exact match for a young child fighting leukemia. Her donation, much the same as donating blood, only took a few hours.
"I see the bad end," she said of her job as a funeral director, who has far too often helped grieving family members who have lost someone because of cancer.
"So to help and do it from a life-saving point, I mean why not, you know. The opportunity to try to help somebody not go through that and to live their life, it's a good thing. It really is," she said.
But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there tend to be less people like Brittany Sims, or at least less available.
"I will say that the number of registrations in general has slowed down," said DKMS spokesperson and donor recruiter Judith Garcia.
Due to the pandemic, DKMS can't hold their usual donor drives with large gatherings of people. So, they need more people to register online for home donation kits, so that the pool of potential donors stays strong.
"We're trying to do everything we can to try to get people to help us and understand the dire need," Garcia said. "Because we might not be in dire need right now but we will be in a couple of years."
According to DKMS, there are approximately 15,000 patients looking for a life-saving match right now. And up to 70% of cancer patients in need of a stem cell or bone marrow transplant, with no direct family member an exact-enough match, will rely on a complete stranger's donation.
Due to privacy laws, it may be a year before Sims knows if her donation did help save that child's life. But one day this funeral director hopes to meet the person, and the life, she helped save.
"I've got a genetic twin somewhere, so you kind of want to know what they look like and do and accomplish in their life," she said. "They gave me in return the biggest reward that I'll ever have is just knowing that I was able to help somebody."
Help she asks that the rest of us, whatever our job or career might be, to consider giving too.
If you'd like to find out how to join the registry, you can find more information here.
Brittany Sims' virtual donor drive can be found here.