Benefiting from Diversity at Middlesex – (and saving lives!)

What can be a better place than university to recruit young and healthy potential donors to find a match for blood cancer? Middlesex University welcomes students from all around the globe that shows the diversity of this university which we celebrate and are proud of.  The meaning of the word diversity is itself a broad concept; it not only includes the dimensions of race but also embraces the gender difference, ethnicity, sexual orientations and many more. Finding a potential donor and saving lives of people suffering from blood cancer is the mission of our marrow society. In many cancers finding a potential donor is the only chance for their survival. Unfortunately, these chances significantly decline if the recipient belongs to ethnic minorities, for instance if the recipient is White North European, they have a 90% chance of finding a match whereas for the more diverse background such as Asians/ Afro-Caribbean the chances fall to 40%. 

Being a president for ‘Marrow society’ (a charitable arm of Anthony Nolan), I can understand the importance of diversity at Middlesex University. We recruit nearly 86% of the people from ethnic and minority on the register from every recruitment clinic. At Black Asian Minority Ethnic (BAME) campaign, held in February, we had signed up 17 donors on the register in a few hours. The diversity among the students is not only seen in their ethnic groups but in their age groups as well. We follow a strict protocol to recruit people from 16-30 age groups however many people have approached us being over 30 years and studying in their 1st years. Diversity at Middlesex in every aspect benefits the marrow society and improves the chance of survival from every race and ethnicity. Among 50 other universities with marrow societies, Middlesex is one of the most diverse universities in term of donor registry and thanks to our DIVERSITY we can make full use of it to save lives.  

If you would like to know more about MARROW see this link: http://www.mdxsu.com/groups/marrow-society--2   We welcome every opportunity to engage with all programmes across the University to include all our diverse fellow students and are supported by many lecturers but could always benefit from more support and advertising!

Maryam Amir, Year 3 Biomedical Sciences
President of Middlesex Marrow Society.