'It's basically taking your life' | Louisville man fights for bone marrow donor

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A Louisville man with a life-threatening cancer diagnosis is fighting to save lives, all while fighting to save his own.

Billy Klein Jr. is in a race to find a bone marrow donor to give him and others a chance at life.

"I just knew I had something. ... CML Leukemia," Klein said.

CML, or Chronic Myeloid Leukemia, is an aggressive blood cancer. For three agonizing years, the 32-year-old's blood has been attacking his body.

"The aggravating thing for me is it's something that you can't see without a microscope," Klein said. "That's basically taking your life."

He takes a cocktail of medications, pills and chemotherapy. He gets regular blood transfusions and "blood boosts" of stem cells donated from his father, but those boosts are finite and less effective because of his father's age.

"There's still a hope and a chance for your immune system, (that) the boost works and it clears more leukemia cells," said Dr. John Chao with UofL Health.

Despite all of this, the cancer may soon cut his life short. Klein's mother is a regular fixture at his check-ups with Chao, but the checkups sometimes feel more like old friends joking around instead of a visit to the doctor.

Chao said what Klein needs is a transplant from a bone marrow donor. In June, Klein matched with a donor from a national registry, giving him and his family hope until the donor withdrew.

Time started slipping away again.

"Seeing (my mom) and my dad have to go through this is probably tougher than me going through it personally," Klein said. "It's a terrible feeling."

"As doctors, we're trained to kind of have a good poker face," Chao said. "But every time you hear something bad like that, we do feel our heart drop a little bit."

Bone Marrow donations are not as involved or painful as they were years ago. A simple cheek swab is done to determine if you're a donor. If you're a match, the cells are donated, and you can walk out the hospital door the same day.

"It involves four days of a shot in the belly," Chao said. "That's to prime your bone marrow to make stem cells. And you just literally sit on this machine for about four hours as it's extracting the stem cells."

Chao said the process can make the donor feel a little achy or tired with flu-like symptoms. 

Klein has been fighting to find a new donor. He has been handing out flyers and speaking to anyone who will listen. He remains hopeful, but his life remains in the hands of others. 

"You can't just sit around and depressed and (say) 'I hate my life,'" Klein said. "If that was the case, I would just quit taking my meds."

Tonya Davis with Be the Match, a national bone marrow donor program said it’s an easy collection process.

"It’s very similar to platelet or plasma donation," Davis said. "It's done through your blood using two IVs in your arm, and it's entirely painless with little to no downtime. About 90% of our donors are donating through that method now."

Davis said registering to be a donor is the easiest part.

"It's incredibly easy to do," she said. "It takes just a few minutes. You can join online or you can join on your cellphone. There's an online registration process that entails some basic contact information, and then you request a swab. Kit to be mailed to your home. So once you receive that swab kit, you follow the easy instructions."

A huge University of Louisville fan, Klein now lives for the hope of a donor, his team and his family.

He stays optimistic but still sees the pain in his family’s eyes.

"I hate it, like, with a passion," Klein said. "I wish any type of pain that they had from this that I can take on myself."

The days continue to tick by. They know every day without a donor is time borrowed in the fight for his life.

Chao said he has had patients before die while waiting on the donor registry.

To join the registry and find out if you're a match to save someone's life, text WDRB 61474.

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