Patient Success Stories

Irish Exchange Student Seeks Treatment, Finds Comfort Far From Home

Postcard from Ireland: Former UMGCC patient Sinead Murray, now back home in Ireland, on a visit to the fishing port of Baltimore in County Cork

Twenty-two year old Sinead Murray was an exchange student from Ireland studying at Washington College in Chestertown, MD, when she became ill and needed to be hospitalized. Sinead shared her thoughts about her diagnosis of aplastic anemia and the care she received as a patient at UMGCC.

Coming to America from Ireland to study for my Master’s degree was a dream come true. At Washington College on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, I was taking classes in business, politics and German, and doing research for my thesis. Life was great. I had taken up yoga and was attending the gym again after a bout of hepatitis A. When I returned home to Ireland at Christmas, I was delighted to tell my parents that I had been accepted into an internship program with the Maryland General Assembly. This meant that I would return to the States a week before classes began to take part in the orientation program and begin the placement.

Perhaps I was a little more tired and pale than usual when I returned to Maryland on January 9, 2005, but I put it down to the hectic holiday season. Fatigue plagued me as I began my internship that week. More troubling, however, were the blood clots that continued to form in my mouth, and several unexplained nosebleeds. My vision was also becoming blurred, as if a camera was constantly being flashed in my eyes. I rationalized my symptoms and avoided going to the doctor, despite my mother’s trans-Atlantic protestations. By Sunday the 16th of January, however, I could no longer ignore my condition. I relented and went to the emergency room at Chester River Hospital, fortunately located very near the college’s campus.

Not expecting to hear anything serious, I was fairly relaxed throughout the wait in the E.R. and the process of having my blood drawn. I hadn’t even phoned my parents to say that I was going to the hospital. So I was puzzled when, returning with my blood test results, the doctor asked “Have you ever had a blood transfusion before?” In no time, they wheeled me to an isolation room and I had the first of many blood transfusions.

The doctor explained that my blood counts were extremely low, a condition that might be caused by a virus. He also mentioned the possibility of aplastic anemia (which I had never heard of before) or leukemia. He recommended sending me to blood disorder specialists at the University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center in Baltimore (UMGCC) for a complete workup. That night I called my parents at 3 a.m. Irish time with the phone call that every parent dreads. By Tuesday evening, they were at my side in Baltimore.

I was taken by ambulance to UMGCC the next morning (thanks, I would later learn, to a expedited referral system between UMGCC and community doctors called OneCall). I was immediately put at ease by the doctors and nurses there. Even though I was alone in a strange place, I was not the least bit panicked.

They performed a wide range of blood tests. On Tuesday morning, I had my first bone marrow test, in which my lower back was numbed and a needle was inserted to extract bone marrow from my hip. A week later, a second bone marrow test was performed to see if there had been any improvement or if the likelihood of a diagnosis of aplastic anemia had increased.

I had to have a number of additional blood and platelet transfusions, which led us to think that the diagnosis was inevitable; however, it still came as a shock. Within days of the second test, my diagnosis of aplastic anemia was confirmed.

Dr. Ronald Gartenhaus (associate professor of Medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and member of the Program for Hematologic Malignancies at the University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center) was extremely helpful in explaining the disease and what the treatment would involve, including a bone marrow transplant. The BMT team (Blood and Marrow Transplant Program team) provided us with helpful information on the transplant procedure and answered our many questions. We particularly appreciated how swiftly they contacted hematologists in Ireland who would carry out the procedure for me back home.

While I was being well-cared for medically and physically, my parents were being taken care of emotionally and spiritually as well. Even before they arrived in the U.S., UMGCC staff had offered for them to stay at the Hope Lodge, (free, comfortable guest housing for cancer patients and their families funded and operated by the American Cancer Society). The lodge quickly became a home-away-from-home for them. Volunteers and other guests alike provided solace to my parents when we were all faced with the uncertainty of my condition. From a warm, welcoming first encounter with a volunteer at the lodge, to pizza nights, meals cooked by volunteers (“Angels of Hope”), game nights and beauty demonstrations, the lodge provided my parents with a “second family.”

During my hospitalization at UMGCC, Baltimore got a heavy winter snow storm, something we were not used to seeing in Ireland. The severe weather conditions never affected the standard of care at the medical center. As the snow fell continuously, nurses opted to stay on when their replacements couldn’t make it in through the bad weather.

I left UMGCC on January 28, and had my first appointment in Ireland in St James’ Hospital in Dublin on February 1. My two brothers were tested to see if they were compatible as donors for me, and fortunately, my younger brother proved to be a match. I had my bone marrow transplant on March 10, following four days of ATG and four days of chemotherapy. I left St. James for home in the first week of April.

It’s been a gradual recovery process since then, with occasional follow-up visits to the clinic. I’ve had plenty of time to think about my future plans, which include returning to my studies at my home university in Cork, Ireland, in the fall. My family and I recently returned from a summer holiday in Scotland. And, most importantly, I’m taking time to enjoy the good things in life these days!

For more information on the Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at the University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center, please call 1-800-888-8823.


This page was last updated on: May 9, 2008.