Lymphoma Survivor Meets Man Who Saved Her Life

BOCA RATON, July 31 – An Iowa mother of three who battled lymphoma met her life-saving blood stem cell donor during Gift of Life Marrow Registry’s Campus Ambassador Symposium this past week at the Boca Raton Marriott at Boca Center.

In a surprise encounter arranged by Gift of Life Marrow Registry, Lisa Dunbar, 50, of Treynor, Iowa, met Sean Conklin, 27, of Delray Beach, Fla. on Sunday night during the Gift of Life event. Dunbar, an IT director at a global provider of financial technology services, was diagnosed in 2013 with an extremely rare and aggressive form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma that did not respond to chemotherapy or radiation therapy. A stem cell transplant was her only hope of survival.

Conklin joined the marrow registry while attending the State University of New York, Plattsburgh, in 2013 and was matched for a stem cell donation to Dunbar the following year. She learned of the match on Thanksgiving 2013. Conklin recently began working for Gift of Life as one of the organization’s Community Engagement Coordinators.

“The impact that someone we don’t even know can have on us is incredible, no matter how brief the interaction can be,” said Dunbar after meeting Conklin. “Each Thanksgiving we always offer a toast to my donor. And this year we have a name to put with that incredible act of selflessness.”

“I don't want it to make it seem like I did something unique,” said Conklin. “I want everyone to feel like they can do this.”

On Tuesday evening, another life-saving donor, Courtney Manning, 21, a Granbury, Texas native who attends Mississippi State University, attended the Campus Ambassador Symposium banquet, to meet Nicole Killem of Raleigh, N.C., the daughter of her recipient, Patricia Zych, 64, of Oscoda, Mich.

Manning joined Gift of Life’s marrow registry at a recruitment drive at Mississippi State in 2017. A few months later, Manning learned she was a match for Zych, who was battling acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), and needed a stem cell transplant to survive. Manning was determined to help, even though it meant donating during her mid-term exams.

The Campus Ambassador Symposium, which took place July 28-31, convened student leaders from 103 colleges and universities for education and training in donor recruitment. Transplant doctors seek donors ages 18-35 more than 85 percent of the time due to clinical reasons that improve transplant outcomes, so Campus Ambassadors play a critical role in facilitating life-saving donor transplants through campus drives.

Since launching in 2014, 540 Campus Ambassadors have volunteered more than 20,200 hours to add 42,350 people to the registry, producing 86 life-saving transplants. In all, 230 Campus Ambassadors at 103 colleges and universities will host drives and events during the 2019-20 school year.