Blood cancer charity Anthony Nolan has made an historic breakthrough in stem cell donation after it arranged for a donation from a 17-year-old girl.

Macclesfield sixth-former Victoria Rathmill signed up to the Anthony Nolan bone marrow register in February this year, when she was still 16 years old, and was identified as a match for a patient with blood cancer within just a few months, which is statistically very rare. [1]

Her donation, which took place at the London Clinic in October, makes her the youngest person ever to provide stem cells for an unrelated transplant.

Anthony Nolan is one of only two bone marrow registers in the world that accept under-18 donors [2], and in October 2012 it became the first register to accept 16 year olds after altering its joining policy age-range from 18-50 to 16-30.

Henny Braund, Chief Executive of Anthony Nolan, hailed this as a positive sign that the policy change was already having an impact on people with blood cancer.

'Transplant doctors are more likely to choose the youngest donor available, and young people are less likely to have health problems that prevent donation when they are identified as a match. We thought long and hard about how best to save the most lives as possible and with Victoria's donation we are seeing the decision pay off.'

Ms Braund also applauded Victoria's achievement. 'Victoria's historic donation is genuinely impressive. It shows both what a special young woman she is, and how teenagers can be sufficiently mature, caring and engaged with the world around them to help save an unwell stranger.'

A-level student Victoria was inspired to join the register after a family friend was diagnosed with leukaemia. Anthony Nolan volunteers visited her school to raise awareness of the donor register.

The charity's educational Register & Be a Lifesaver (R&Be) programme was started in 2009 following a campaign by patient Adrian Sudbury, and is a joint initiative between Anthony Nolan and the NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT). Now managed and funded entirely by Anthony Nolan, its aim is to inform teenagers and young adults about the realities of blood, bone marrow and organ donation.

Anthony Nolan was invited with NHSBT to give a talk at All Hallows Catholic College in November 2012, as part of the school's religious education programme. [3]

Michelle Garvey, Assistant Principal of All Hallows Catholic College says the decision to invite Anthony Nolan into schools was part of a concerted effort to make students question their future role in society.

'At their age students are starting to make decisions about things like giving blood and it's about helping them to make informed choices. We introduced the concept in school with the idea that maybe when they were older and had left home it would be something they would consider doing. From our point of view we wanted parents to be aware that we have opened up this information to students but that it wasn't anything that we were forcing them to take on board.'