Community Corner

Summit Community Comes Together To Help 5-Year-Old Girl

They're raising awareness to help a family of a 5-year-old girl with leukemia who needs a bone marrow transplant.

Summit, NJ.
Summit, NJ. (Caren Lissner/Patch)

SUMMIT, NJ — Residents of Chatham and Summit are raising awareness about a Summit 5-year-old girl who has a rare form of leukemia and needs a bone marrow transplant.

Brian Erb, a Summit resident who's also a biology and special ed teacher at Chatham High School, told PIX11 News last week that last spring, he and his wife noticed that daughter Jackie was bruising much more easily than twin sister Addie. They had a series of tests and found out that she had a kind of leukemia, juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia, that's hard to treat.

She needs a bone marrow transplant to live.

Find out what's happening in Summitfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

This past weekend, the Chatham School District was scheduled to host a bone marrow screening at the high school, handing people swab kits through their car windows. For those who missed the event, test kits are available.

Go to the Be-A-Match website and register, or text teamjackie (one word) to 61474. The sooner, the better, the PIX story said.

Find out what's happening in Summitfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

Read more about the family and how to help out in Chatham Patch.

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