A year after she got her college degree, Renetta Waupoose learned she had leukemia, a blood cancer.
More bad news came a few months later. Waupoose needed a transplant of blood-forming stem cells, but her brother wasn’t a match. Nor were any adults on the donor registry.
Finally, good news arrived. Doctors said Waupoose could become the first adult patient at UW Hospital to receive a transplant of umbilical-cord blood. It contains stem cells that grow into blood cells.