“From the bottom of our hearts, we ask you to help us continue to make a difference"

Father of three daughters, Ian, 42 from Hoddeston, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia.

Ian, a father of three charming daughters, a golfer and devoted Arsenal fan from Hoddelston was sadly diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) shortly after his 42nd birthday in September 2017.

Late November last year, we launched an appeal to help find the perfect match for Ian and other people in need of donation. His story reached thousands and the search triggered a humungous wave of attention!

Jamie Redknapp, Holly Willoughby, Rylan, Teddy Sheringham, Tamsin Outhwaite and Ray Winstone to (name but a few) showed supported our search sharing messages encouraging their followers to register.

That week, more than 9,000 new people signed up to register as a potential blood stem cell donor!

Sadly, a match wasn’t found for Ian and he needed a stem cell transplant quickly so Ian received a blood stem cell donation from his dad last week. Although they weren’t a perfect match, the donation was Ian’s fighting chance at beating blood cancer.

Ian’s wife, Hannah has thanked everyone who’s backed #IansArmy for their support and kindly asked them to continue supporting others like Ian who are also fighting against blood cancer:

“From the bottom of our hearts, we ask you to help us continue to make a difference, to raise awareness of blood cancer, to host swab hubs, to register potential donors, to make noise.

Most importantly, to help families faced with this awful news, to give them hope that their loved one will find a donor on the registry. The more of us that register, the more possibilities of that happening there are.”

We’re wishing you good luck with the recovery and hope you’re back to playing golf and watching Arsenal in no time!

We will continue to work tirelessly towards registering more and more people as potential blood stem cell donors and help give more second chances of life to people like you!