Beans for Better Life

Beans for Better Life provides a unique opportunity for your fundraising campaign. Sales of this coffee will not only support your campaign, but also the needs of farming communities around the world--that's an awesome proposition! Beans for Better Life only provides Fair Trade Certified ™ coffees.

Each case contains 24 bags of coffee (12 oz.), and both regular and decaffeinated options are available. By selling regular coffee for $10/bag and decaffeinated coffee for $12/bag, you could make a profit of $58.20 per case.

Please contact your fundraising consultant for more information and to place your orders.

Philadelphia Doctor a Pioneer of Bloodless Treatment

Jock Davis smiled and sat up on his bed at Pennsylvania Hospital [...], looking more like a guy on vacation than on high-dose chemotherapy for a blood cancer called multiple myeloma.

He had come all the way from Rochester, N.Y., for a stem cell transplant because Patricia Ford, the doctor directing his care, was willing to withhold a standard part of the multi-week treatment: a blood transfusion.

As a Jehovah's Witness, Davis, 48, has religious objections to receiving blood, including his own. Ford, director of the hospital's Center for Bloodless Medicine and Surgery, performed the world's first no-transfusion stem cell transplant more than 15 years ago.

While most centers still consider it too risky to attempt, Ford keeps making history. Davis was her 100th "bloodless" transplant patient, an unprecedented milestone.

"People think I'm doing something mystical or magical," said Ford, a blood and cancer specialist. "It's not."

And bloodless therapy is not just for Jehovah's Witnesses.

Although Ford's strategies - many surprisingly low-tech and commonsense - were developed to enable Witnesses to undergo major elective surgeries, they have become standard throughout Pennsylvania Hospital. The bloody truth is that avoiding transfusions reduces complications, costs, and recovery time for patients in general.

"It's amazing," said Ford, "how much blood is collected and wasted and given unnecessarily in this country."

The primary components of blood seem a bit magical, even if Ford's methods aren't. If red blood cells stop ferrying oxygen throughout the body, vital organs die within minutes. White blood cells are the immune system's army, fighting invaders. Platelets regulate clotting, instantly sensing when blood is leaking. These cells all float in the watery plasma.

The blood also contains more than a thousand minor components, including the stem cells that give rise to all of it.

Jehovah's Witnesses - with more than a million members in the United States - reject transfusions because they broadly interpret a Bible passage that bans the "eating" of blood. However, as science has revealed the fluid's complexity, that interpretation has evolved to apply only to the four primary blood components, not to stem cells.

"I don't need a doctor who shares my beliefs," Davis said. "I just need one who respects them."

In the 1990s, Ford developed a reputation among Witnesses for doing exactly that.

To read the full story, visit Philly.com.

Tennessee’s First Berlin Heart Infant Receives Heart Transplant

The following article is from HealthCanal.com.

NASHVILLE, TN – Nathan Roberts, an 18-month-old patient from Snead, Ala., whose heart has been operating with the help of a mechanical assistance device called the Berlin Heart since May 27, 2010, received a donor heart early yesterday morning at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt.

Doctors say the transplant surgery went well, and Nathan is recovering as planned. Nathan is the first infant in Tennessee to receive the Berlin Heart, a device which has been manually pumping the left ventricle of his damaged heart for more than seven months while he waited for a donor organ. Nathan’s transplant began around 8 p.m., Wednesday night, and doctors finished shortly before 4 a.m., Thursday morning. Nathan’s cardiologist, Debra Dodd, M.D., director of Pediatric Heart Transplant, and her team continue to closely monitor his progress.

“Overall, the operation was a big success,” says Karla Christian, M.D., the lead pediatric heart surgeon who performed the surgery. “The new heart looked very happy inside Nathan’s chest and it was working very well. It’s a great heart and we hope it will last him a long time.”

Christian says the transplant was essential for Nathan, who was on ECMO (Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation) for two weeks before Children’s Hospital got the go-ahead from a federal review board last May to use the experimental Berlin Heart. The device, a smaller version of other left ventricular assist devices (LVADs) used in adults, is the only one of its kind for small infants and children, and it is not yet approved for widespread use by the federal Food and Drug Administration.

“We’re thankful we had the Berlin device available,” says Christian. “He wouldn’t have survived without it. At this point, we are hoping he will have a long, happy life.”

Nathan’s mother, Amanda, has been by her son’s side throughout his eight-month stay at Children’s Hospital, and was all smiles Wednesday night when her family finally received news that a donor heart was available. She says “Bernie,” the family’s playful nickname for the Berlin Heart device, has served them well.

“He has saved Nathan’s life. He has served his purpose, but we are more than happy to trade it in and bring Nathan home,” she says.

Each year, more than 35,000 babies are born with congenital heart defects, and about 5,000 of them die, according to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

Christian says Nathan’s success illustrates the fact that the Berlin Heart can be a very effective option for children with heart defects, depending on the circumstance.

“The Berlin Heart is essential to the survival of infants and young children who need long-term mechanical support prior to implantation,” says Christian.

MyMedSchedule.com

MyMedSchedule.com offers a convenient way for patients to stay up-to-date on their vital medications. Visit the website to watch a video demo of this free service.

Testimonials from patients and their loved ones:

"Since my husband's kidney transplant three months ago, I have been happy to use MyMedSchedule.com. It gave us support and safety in the middle of the stress that a transplant is. And now it allows us to update my husband's medication after each visit to the doctor."

Francine Godet, Psy.D.
New York, NY

"We went through a successful kidney transplant in November 2007, and were introduced to MyMedSchedule through the transplant hospital (University of California, San Diego Medical Center). We love it because it enables us to keep up-to-date medication lists--thanks for this handy program that we can't do without!"

Debbie and Kevin Clark
Lakeside, CA

“Following a liver transplant at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pa., I had a daily regimen of 19 different medications. If I did not have MyMedSchedule I would have had problems. All the doctors and nurses in my transplant experience have sincerely helped me, and MyMedSchedule is no exception. Thanks so much.”

Nicholas Marino
Philadelphia, PA

City of Hope Reaches Historic Treatment Milestone with 10,000th Bone Marrow Transplant

City of Hope, which helped pioneer bone marrow transplantation three and a half decades ago, performed its 10,000th transplant on Jan. 13, becoming one of the first institutions in the world to reach this milestone. Bone marrow or stem cell transplantation -- collectively known as hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) -- is a complex, often lifesaving procedure in which stem cells are used to help cure patients of their cancer. It is most often used for patients battling diseases like leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma.

“Reaching 10,000, you think about the many people -- children and adults -- who have benefited from City of Hope’s care and research -- the many wonderful people who have come here trusting us to care for them, hoping for a cure.”

“Day to day, our work is all about a single life at stake that we’re trying to save,” said Stephen J. Forman, M.D., Francis and Kathleen McNamara Distinguished Chair in Hematology and Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation and chair of the Department of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation. “Reaching 10,000, you think about the many people -- children and adults -- who have benefited from City of Hope’s care and research -- the many wonderful people who have come here trusting us to care for them, hoping for a cure.”

In the nearly 35 years since City of Hope physicians performed one of the nation’s first successful bone marrow transplants, the institution has helped transplantation evolve into a gold standard treatment for several diseases.

On Jan. 13, 2011, City of Hope performed its 10,000th transplant on a patient with advanced leukemia who received stem cells from an unrelated volunteer donor who was a compatible match.

City of Hope performed its first successful bone marrow transplant in 1976 on a young college student from Indiana who was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. His physician told him he should prepare himself for inevitable death. But his cousin, a physician in Los Angeles, knew that City of Hope was launching a bone marrow transplant program. The young student went to City of Hope to undergo a bone marrow transplant, and he has remained in remission for 35 years.

Each year, he and thousands of other survivors, their families and hospital staff attend City of Hope’s Bone Marrow Transplant Reunion, a rite of spring held on the Duarte, Calif. campus.

City of Hope currently performs nearly 500 bone marrow transplant procedures each year. During transplant, patients typically undergo high doses of chemotherapy and/or radiation that help eradicate the cancer cells but also destroy their bone marrow and immune systems. Patients then receive stem cells from one of several sources which then rebuild their blood and immune systems. Different sources of stem cells can be utilized depending on the disease and the availability of stem cell donors. Autologous transplants isolate and use the patient’s own healthy stem cells. Related donor allogeneic transplants use donor stem cells from a compatible relative or sibling, while unrelated donor allogeneic transplants use cells from altruistic volunteers who registered themselves as potential bone marrow donors. Umbilical cord blood stem cells also can be used. City of Hope recently was recognized by the National Marrow Donor Program registry as the only center in 2010 to achieve above average survival rates in unrelated transplants for five consecutive years.

“All of our research and treatment efforts reflect our commitment to patients and their families -- recognizing each of them as a dignified human being with a story to tell and a life to live,” said Forman. “They also are our partners in developing new therapies for those who will come to us tomorrow for care. There are a significant number of people who are alive today because they were and are a part of something we did at City of Hope that was both bold and new.”

To read the full story, click here.

January Patient of the Month: Sofia Lumi Bentos

Even though she's still a toddler, Sofia has faced more obstacles than most people can imagine. When she was only 2 months old, she was diagnosed with biliary atresia. Since then she has battled several illness, including tuberculosis. Now, she relies on 10 medications and two constant IVs to keep her liver functioning. Doctors say a liver transplant is her only hope for a second chance at life, and she was added to the transplant list in August 2010.

Sofia is a bright, creative and fun little girl. She speaks three languages: English, Spanish and Finnish and enjoys playing the piano, singing, dancing, reading and going on walks.

Unfortunately, her condition and frequent hospital visits do not allow her to enjoy many of her favorite activities.

To learn more about Sofia or to make a donation in her honor, visit her web bio on the NFT site.

NFT Patients Who Received Transplants in December

Congratulations to the NFT patients who received their lifesaving transplants last month! We wish them all a healthy recovery.

• Denny Bradford (lung) at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center


• Jennifer Jacques (heart) at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center


• Oral Semore (liver) at Integris Nazih Zuhdi Transplant Institute


• Linda Sisk (kidney) at Methodist University Hospital Transplant Institute