A few years after signing up to become a bone marrow donor, the woman finally coincided with a transplant patient.
In 2017, Mya Linklater signed up for the Anthony Nolan Register, a charity founded by Shirley Nolan in 1974, creating the world's first stem cell register. As of 2024, they have over 909,000 potential donors and are being asked to donate bone marrow or blood stem cells for life-saving transplants.
Eight years after signing up, 24-year-old Linklater was surprised when she received an email in May 2025 to notify her that it was a potential match for patients on the list. Since Aberdeen's Linklater in Scotland had been on the register for a long time, she thought she might have to actually help.
But when she finally got the opportunity, she told Newsweek that she felt “really excited” to save a life.
“I filled out the medical renewal form and then came to my house to collect blood samples to make sure I was the perfect donor,” Linklater said.
@myalinklater / tiktok
Everything came back clearly and she was moved ahead to donate her marrow. She wanted to know more about the patients she was donating. That's when she learns that it's for a young baby with leukemia.
She made the process even more rewarding as she can give this baby a shot in a fulfilling life.
Soon afterwards, she was appointed to a preliminary medical appointment on a two-hour flight from Scotland to London before proceeding with a very important operation in June.
“This is a surgical procedure performed under general anesthesia, where doctors extract the fluid bone marrow containing stem cells from the back of the brain bone and use a needle and syringe to extract it,” Linklater told Newsweek.
Bone marrow donations are used to obtain blood-forming cells (stem cells) and can help people with blood cancer or blood disorders. According to the Cleveland Clinic, bone marrow is liquid tissue located at the heart of certain bones, producing more than 200 billion new blood cells every day.
Unfortunately, about 18,000 people are said to have a myeloid disease that requires bone marrow or stem cell transplants each year. Thirty percent of people in need of donors can find matches within their families, while 70% of patients need donors from the register.
People in the US can register with the National Bone Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) by participating in donor centers or requesting home test kits. Not everyone is a donor because certain conditions (HIV, cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.) disqualify people and are over 60 years old.
Millions of people around the world are registered donors, but there is still an overwhelming shortage. Therefore, Linklater has decided to document the entire process to raise awareness and encourage others in the UK to participate in the Anthony Nolan Register.
She then shared the video in June on her Tiktok account (@MyalinkLater). At the time of writing, it has over 733,000 views and over 112,600 likes! It went viral.
“The online response was absolutely crazy. I love how kind and warm messages are flooded, many people have shared their stories and now I'm on the register,” Linklater continued.
“This process is extremely rewarding and I can't stress how important it is to join the register.”
@myalinklater / tiktok
Following the bone marrow harvest, Linklater said he felt “a slight discomfort,” but overall it was absolutely fine. She quickly recovered and was incredibly proud of giving her young child a second chance in life.
After sharing her experience online, many Tiktok users praised Linklater for using her social media platform in such a positive way, and others thanked her for being so transparent. This has so far resulted in over 2,500 comments on virus posts.
For her pleasure, many people said they joined the register as a result of her video.
One comment reads, “Thank you as a mom who had a bone marrow transplant that saved her baby's life.”
Another Tiktok user wrote:
Another added: “It's really incredible. Thank you for sharing your experience, Mya.”
While one commenter responded, “I joined for your video!”
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