Bloodworks 101
Started in 2020, Bloodworks 101 is an Anthem Award-winning, weekly podcast produced by Bloodworks Northwest, a Seattle-based blood bank and research center. Episodes are designed to inspire and educate listeners to donate time, money or blood.
On Bloodworks 101 you'll meet experts who can discuss everything from the importance of blood donation to trypanophobia (fear of needles).
Emmy Award-winning producer John Yeager, is joined by a team of gifted storytellers Bill Harper, Helen Pitlick and Juan Cotto.
In 2024, Bloodworks 101 won its fourth coveted Anthem Award, beating out more than 2,000 entries from 43 nations.
Bloodworks 101
Hope, A Bone Marrow Transplant & A Family Secret: A Sister's Search (S3 E1)
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This is a story about a bone marrow transplant, a mother’s dying wish, a long-held family secret, and how one way to find your sister is by saving her life fourteen years before you met her for the first time. And how all those things came together from six states away in a way that even the people involved still find hard to believe.
When Judy Larraga’s oncologist told her she needed a bone marrow transplant to be cured of Chronic Myeloid Leukemia in 2004, she consented to the aggressive procedure immediately, despite the risks and challenging treatment course it entailed. And as a Hispanic woman, her chances of finding a suitable donor match to even get the transplant were just 46%. But she never lost hope that there’d be someone out there to help her.
Who that “somebody” turned out to be would change Judy’s life forever, strengthen her faith in God, and bring a whole new dimension to a family secret her mother revealed on her death bed. It would be 15 years before she knew the rest of the story.