Today, as part of the “Life in Every Drop of Blood” campaign, the Ministry of Health hosted a lecture on the development of the domestic bone marrow donation institute, inviting transfusion doctors and oncohematologists.
On the eve of World Childhood Cancer Day, a large-scale information campaign was launched in Kazakhstan to promote bone marrow donation.
The goal of the initiative is to draw public attention to the development of bone marrow donation and save the lives of patients with oncohematological diseases.
“In Kazakhstan, more than 8,000 patients with blood cancer are registered, about 1,500 new cases are registered annually, including 600 new cases in children. For most of them, the only hope for recovery is a bone marrow transplant, although the probability of compatibility between unrelated donors and recipients is only 1 in 10,000 cases. Therefore, for the successful treatment of oncology patients with blood diseases, it is necessary to expand the possibilities of searching for unrelated donors in the Kazakhstani registry,” noted Magripa Embergenova, Director of the Department of Maternal and Child Health of the Ministry of Health.
“The national registry of bone marrow donors in Kazakhstan was created in 2011 on the basis of the Scientific and Production Center for Transfusion. As of February 4, 2025, it had 12,742 potential donors, and last year the registry was replenished with 1,673 new donors. 16 transplants were performed from its national registry, and one more will be performed this month. There are many myths and prejudices around bone marrow donation in society, but in fact this is a completely painless procedure that does not harm health and is carried out under the strict supervision of our doctors,” noted Saniya Abdrakhmanova, Head of the National Scientific and Production Center for Transfusion of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan, a high-category transfusion specialist.
S. According to Abdrakhmanova, over the past few decades, the practice of exchanging stem cells between countries has been established. Our donors can be matched to foreign patients and vice versa. Kazakhstan has donated 4 transplants abroad, in one of these cases our donor turned out to be the only suitable donor in the world for an Italian patient.
The global bone marrow donor registry includes more than 40 million people, in particular, in Germany, there are more than 10 million stem cell donors in the registry, 2,500 unrelated allogeneic bone marrow transplants have been performed.
Today, bone marrow transplant operations for children are performed on the basis of two centers - the Scientific Center for Pediatrics and Pediatric Surgery of Almaty and the UMC Medical Center, where about 470 hematopoietic stem cell transplants have been performed since 2012.
"More than 200 hematopoietic stem cell transplant operations have been performed at the UMC Medical Center. "The five-year survival rate of our patients in 2024 will be 86%," said Balzhan Omirbekova, head of the Department of Bone Marrow Donation at the UMC Public Health Center, during the lecture.
As part of the campaign, lectures on the topic of "Bone Marrow Donation" will be held in local areas with the participation of employees of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Health Departments of all regions of the country, and blood will be taken from those wishing to enter the Bone Marrow Donor Registry.
National Registry of Bone Marrow Donors: Key Facts

🔹 Donors of the National Registry undergo high-resolution typing at 5 loci that meet international standards.
The National Registry of Bone Marrow Donors represents representatives of more than 30 nationalities, which makes it ethnically representative for the people of Kazakhstan.
Since the creation of the registry, 271 requests have been received from patients to search for a donor. As a result, 16 unrelated transplants were performed, including 4 for foreign patients (Russia - 3, Italy - 1).
Who can be a HSC donor?
The National Registry of Hematopoietic Stem Cell Donors is a database of potential bone marrow donors whose compatibility with patients in need of transplantation can be checked. Kazakhstanis aged 18 to 45, weighing more than 50 kilograms, not suffering from serious diseases (oncology, hepatitis B and C, angina pectoris, previous myocardial infarction, tuberculosis, autoimmune diseases, etc.) can become bone marrow donors.
How to enter the National Registry of Bone Marrow Donors?
Entry into the National Registry of Bone Marrow Donors is voluntary and free of charge and includes several simple steps:
✅You need to visit the nearest blood center;
✅Fill out a questionnaire, sign a consent;
✅Donate blood from a vein into 1 glass device (9 ml) for HLA-typing;
If the phenotypes between the donor and the patient match, the donor will be included in the database of the Bone Marrow Donor Registry, and the registry will contact the donor.
The Scientific and Production Center of Transfusiology of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Public Foundation "Assel Baiseitova Charity Foundation" are the organizers of the campaign "Life in Every Drop of Blood".
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Source : https://www.gov.kz/memleket/entities/dsm/press/news/details/931974