Kevin Cowley made a simple decision one day that saved the life of a little girl.

 

Late one night, Cowley was watching TV when he saw an ad come on the tube promoting a marrow registry called Be the Match. Kevin had contemplated becoming a bone marrow donor after seeing his grandmother suffer from the effects of leukemia and be treated with chemotherapy and blood work that eventually took her life just this past January.

 

After watching the TV commercial and pondering the commitment, Cowley decided to look up the information on the bethematch.org website and then ordered the swab kit.

 

That decision had an impact on him but also suddenly became very important to a small girl halfway across the nation.

 

Nora Getchell, 6, of Mastic Beach, NY was diagnosed with a rare bone marrow disorder in May of 2011 called Aplastic Anemia (AA). It’s a disease that makes ones’ bone marrow stop making enough new blood cells. Nora’s AA was extremely severe and doctors immediately started treatment on her with the hope chemo and other blood work would help cure the spirited six-year-old. 

 

Nothing seemed to be working.

 

After successfully qualifying as a bone marrow donor, Kevin received a call in 2011 from Be The Match, asking if he’d be willing to donate his marrow for a six-year-old little girl. Kevin consented, but after a few days, Be The Match contacted him and said the doctors decided to do different treatment so he wasn’t needed. Little did Kevin know, that six-year-old little girl was Nora.

 

With Be The Match, the registry typically likes to go with donors who are younger in age, increasing the likelihood of the marrow being healthy and productive.

 

Kevin at the time was 27-years-old.

 

So Nora’s physicians went with a donor from Norway who graciously donated his bone marrow to try and save Nora’s life.

 

The procedure did not “take”.

 

Incredibly, the Norwegian man was asked if he would be willing to try and donate peripheral stem cells and he obliged. Unfortunately, that procedure did not take either.

 

In October of 2013, Kevin was contacted again by Be The Match and asked if he would be willing to do the bone marrow transplant for a little girl. He never hesitated and was sent to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester Oct. 3 of 2013 for the procedure which many have declared is a painful operation.

 

Kevin says it hardly hurt at all.

 

“I was told beforehand that it was supposed to be painful but I figured what is a week or two of discomfort when you have the chance to change or save someone’s life?” he said.

 

For a bone marrow harvest procedure like Kevins, doctors administer general anesthesia to the patient and the marrow is removed from the back of both hip bones.  The amount of marrow removed depends on the weight of the person who is receiving it.

 

While Kevin was anesthetized, a medical courier waited nearby to immediately garner the marrow and board a helicopter.

 

In the meantime, Nora was being prepped in New York that same day for the transplant. Doctors administered a high-dose of chemo and radiation to kill any cancer cells in Nora’s body. This procedure also kills all healthy bone marrow that remains and allows new stem cells to grow in the bone marrow.

 

Within hours of Kevin’s donation, doctors were working with Nora to deliver new marrow into her bloodstream via a central venous catheter. The process is similar to getting a blood transfusion. The stem cells travel through the blood into the bone marrow.

 

Cowley eventually woke from the marrow surgery and was asked by a nurse if he needed any pain medications. Kevin said ‘no”.

 

“I was a little surprised it wasn’t more painful,” he said. “Basically it felt like someone was pushing their knuckles into my waistline and that was about it.”

 

Kevin wasn’t completely in the clear to go home, however as he began feeling nauseous and vomiting.

 

“That’s typical of my reaction to anesthesia though,” Kevin said.

 

So he spent one night at the Mayo and got ready to head home the next day.

 

While Kevin was getting ready to go the next day, he noticed his nurse come in his room followed by a group of nine to 10 Mayo physicians.

 

“My first thought was, ‘Oh my God, did they find cancer or something?’”

 

But after a few seconds, Kevin realized the doctors had shown up to give Cowley a hearty “thank you” for being a donor and helping to possibly save a person’s life.

 

“Here are these doctors from such a high-end facility like Mayo coming to me to thank me for my generosity,” Kevin said. “It’s amazing how many people were touched by this simple act.”

 

Doctors were immediately excited to see Nora’s system take to the graft and their optimism continued to grow week after week, month after month. At the critical three month checkpoint, Nora’s body was functioning well though the doctors had to monitor her iron levels because of all the blood transfusions she had been receiving over the course of the three years of her detection.

 

At the six month stage, Nora had a slight risk occur when, sure enough, her body was reacting to high levels of iron in her blood. In fact, Kevin says, his marrow was rejecting her body — not the other way around.

 

But by the 12 month threshold, Nora’s doctors gave her the “all clear” and she was able to go about being the little girl she so desperately wanted to be since her diagnosis in 2011. At this point, the Getchells and the Cowleys could exchange phone numbers, email contacts and the such to correspond with each other if they in fact wanted to.

 

And they did.

 

At this time, Kevin decided to send Nora a gift — a beautiful locket necklace with a photo of him and her in it that she could wear at all times.

 

Nora reciprocated with a sliver bracelet for Kevin that has the words, “My donor, my hero. Love Nora.” The two families have exchanged photos of each other and even skyped a time or two.

 

With all the notoriety he has received for his generous and selfless act to save this total stranger, Kevin has been in the spotlight the last few years. Newscasts have caught on to his story and even producers from the Rachael Ray and the Ellen Degeneres TV shows have contacted him for his story. He had to turn them down for personal reasons — one being he’d much rather meet Nora and the family in a private setting rather than on national TV in front of millions of viewers.

 

And that day is just around the corner.

 

The Getchells had contacted Kevin — now 31 — a while ago and mentioned they were conducting a fundraising effort to get the Cowley family to come visit them at their home in New York this summer. Kevin balked at the fundraising idea, saying he would have no problem paying for the trip on his own, but Nora’s mother, Maureen insisted, saying “it’s the least we can do for Nora’s hero.”

 

“As a matter of fact, Maureen said  ‘there are lots of people out here who want to do this’ for me and my family,” said Kevin. “I guess the whole community the Getchells live in has been affected by this.”

 

The date for the trip is July 8 and the Getchells have a Go Fund Me web page set up to accept donations (gofundme.com/friendsofnora). So far, they’ve tallied $3,911 towards their $5,000 goal to bring Kevin, his wife Erika and their two children (Drake and Griffin) out to New York for three days.

 

“My deepest passion right now is to get the word out about being a bone marrow donor and letting people know how simple it is to change or save someone’s life,” he said. “This experience is a major milestone for me right behind my marriage and the birth of my two sons. Nora is now considered healthy and is starting to do little girl things like ride horses, go to waterparks and even attend school. Just hearing those things makes me smile and know it was all worth it.”

 

To become a donor candidate and possibly be a life saver, go to bethematch.org and click the “join” button. Or, to donate money or your time, click “give” at the top of the page.

 

The Cowleys live in St. Cloud and have been married for seven years. Kevin works as a heavy equipment operator at Sherco in Becker and is a 2002 graduate of Becker High School.