Justin McGloin, 11, sick with leukemia, waits at Hasbro Children's for bone-marrow donor

G. Wayne Miller, The Providence Journal
·4 min read

PROVIDENCE — The call to Katie McGloin came in July 2021 from the summer camp her son, Justin, 10 years old at the time, was attending.

The boy was sick. Could she please pick him up?

When Katie arrived, the camp nurse said Justin was experiencing chest pains.

“He was very pale and his heart rate was elevated,” Katie recalled in an interview on Tuesday. His doctor couldn’t see him that day, but she advised Katie to take him immediately to an urgent care center.

When they got there, “the doctor took one look at him and said, ‘He’s going to Hasbro.’ ”

As in Hasbro Children’s Hospital.

Mother Katie and 11-year-old Justin McGloin, who is sick with leukemia, at Hasbro Children's awaiting a bone-marrow transplant.
Mother Katie and 11-year-old Justin McGloin, who is sick with leukemia, at Hasbro Children's awaiting a bone-marrow transplant.

The doctor notified the hospital, a Lifespan facility, that the boy was on his way, and when Katie arrived at the emergency department with Justin, he was admitted. Tests resulted in a diagnosis of acute myeloid leukemia, a bone-marrow and blood cancer.

Justin, said Katie, “had never had a broken bone, no stitches, nothing.”

Now he was facing a potentially fatal disorder.

“That first night was a long night,” Katie said. “I was numb.”

And then she, Justin, and the Hasbro team got going.

After success, the cancer returns

Justin’s initial treatment included chemotherapy and required regular blood transfusions.

It worked.

The boy’s cancer went into remission and he was discharged from the hospital to resume his life in Lincoln, where he and his mother live.

But the cancer returned, not long before Justin was set to begin sixth grade at Lincoln Middle School.

Katie McGloin with her 11-year-old son Justin, who is sick with leukemia and is at Hasbro Children's Hospital awaiting a bone-marrow transplant.
Katie McGloin with her 11-year-old son Justin, who is sick with leukemia and is at Hasbro Children's Hospital awaiting a bone-marrow transplant.

“After a short four month remission,” Katie wrote on Aug. 24 on Mighty McGloin, the Facebook page she created, “Justin’s treatment has begun again so he can get back to being a fun loving eleven year old. Justin enjoys fishing, swimming, video games and building complex Legos.”

And with that, Katie opened a public appeal for a donor who could provide the bone marrow that must be transplanted into her son. Normal cells from such a donation will grow inside a patient’s bloodstream, producing the healthy platelets and red and white blood cells needed for survival.

'It was really hard for me'

As he awaits the transplant, Justin is receiving stabilizing blood transfusions and other care at Hasbro Children’s, where he was readmitted on Sept. 2.

“If you've been here for a long time,” he said on Tuesday during an interview at the hospital, “you, like, get used to it. But when I first came here, it was really hard for me because I had never done this before.”

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He thought: So what am I gonna do? What's going to happen?

Hasbro’s health care professionals haven’t been the only ones by Justin's side. Katie has been living there with him since Sept. 2 as she manages the campaign to find blood donors and a marrow donor – and continues, virtually, her job at West Warwick’s Natco Home, a manufacturer of textiles, rugs and other home furnishings.

Roma Bhuta, one of the doctors at Hasbro Children's Hospital working with Justin.
Roma Bhuta, one of the doctors at Hasbro Children's Hospital working with Justin.

One of Justin’s doctors, Roma Bhuta, a hematologist and oncologist and assistant professor at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, is a partner in the quest for a marrow donor.

“There's an international registry where [potential] donors are basically compiled in a system,” Bhuta said. Prospective donors can learn about eligibility at the registry, BeTheMatch.org. If they decide to volunteer, the group will send a kit with instructions on taking a cheek swab and sending the sample back to be analyzed for compatibility with waiting recipients such as Justin.

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“You get put into this registry and you stay there indefinitely,” Bhuta said. “And if at any point there's someone anywhere around the world who needs a bone-marrow transplant and you are matched with them, the organization will reach out to you and say ‘would you be willing to donate your bone marrow at this time?’ ”  

When a match for Justin is found, his transplant will take place in Boston, at the Dana Farber/Boston Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Center. No facility in Rhode Island offers the treatment.

How to help Justin

Those interested in registering to be a donor can do so Saturday at the latest so-called "swab event," at the Franklin Farm Harvest Fest, 142 Abbott Run Valley Rd. in Cumberland. Blood drives and other events are listed on the Mighty McGloin Facebook page.

On Saturday, Justin will turn 12.

"This year we will be celebrating inpatient, as we did last year as well," Katie said. "The best birthday gift he could receive would be a donor match.  Not only would it be a gift to him but also to me and everyone else who loves him."

Learn more about bone-marrow donation at https://bethematch.org/ 

A GoFundMe page has been opened to help with expenses that will arise while Justin is in Boston for his transplant: https://bit.ly/3dx8uhX 

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Lincoln boy awaits bone-marrow transplant to fight cancer