By AsianWeek Staff January 27, 2014Posted in: Arts-Entertainment, Bay Area, Events, News Laugh for Lives is a comedy show benefitingAsian American Donor Program, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the availability of potential stem cells donors for patients with life threatening diseases curable by a stem cell transplant. Ethnic minority individuals are desperately needed to register as a potential bone marrow/stem cell donor. Laugh for Lives 2014 will take place on Friday, March 7, 2014 at the Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco.The list of performers includes Eli Nicolas, Paul Ogata, Omid Singh, Tina Kim and hosted by Jimmy Ouyang. To purchase tickets:http://www.aadp.org/lfl14/. For $5 discount off, enter discount code:Asianweek. Free Parking:http://www.palaceoffinearts.org/Directions.html Because finding a matching donor is often based on ethnicity, and because there are so few Asian American and Pacific Islander donors listed on the National Registry, many patients are not able to find a perfect matching donor. AADPs goal is to register more ethnic minority donors and give patients a greater chance of finding a perfect match early on in their diagnosis. It costs $100 to add one (1) new donor onto the Registry. We need your help to continue our cause so no donor is asked … Continue reading →

Sandy Hirsch was diagnosed with blood cancer in 2009, and a year later, she spent several weeks at Duke University to get a bone marrow transplant that wasnt available in Charlotte. Today, the 65-year-old multiple myeloma patient is celebrating the opening of an adult bone marrow transplant unit at Carolinas Medical Center. It means patients like her will no longer have to travel hours for treatment and be away from home for weeks at a time. Its wonderful, Hirsch said last week. What a joy it would have been to have it in Charlotte and to keep my family around me. The 16-bed, $10.5 million transplant unit the fourth such program in North Carolina opened Jan. 22 at Carolinas Medical Center, the flagship hospital in Carolinas HealthCare System. Until last week, Charlotte was the largest U.S. city without an adult bone marrow transplant program. Its just a short walk from the hospital systems Levine Cancer Institute, which opened in 2012 and has since hired nine specialists in hematologic oncology, or blood cancer. They come from some of the most prestigious U.S. medical centers, including the Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins University. Weve recruited a cadre of physicians with expertise in … Continue reading →