Good Morning America Anchor has MDS

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Photo from Wikipedia under Creative Commons license

Robin Roberts, co-anchor of the ABC television show Good Morning America since 2005, announced today that she has myelodysplastic syndrome. Her on-the-air announcement was emotional but echoed the reactions of many newly diagnosed MDS patients, with a resolve to beat the disease and a strong reliance on a personal support team.

Roberts is 51 and physically fit, giving her an edge over older or infirm patients, but she has the disadvantage of having secondary MDS following breast cancer in 2007, for which she was treated with chemotherapy and radiation in 2007 and 2008.

As an African-American, Roberts would have faced tough odds finding a match in the bone marrow registry. Luckily, her older sister Sally-Ann Roberts is a match and agreed to be her donor. The transplant is expected to take place this summer or fall.

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This week the National Marrow Donor Program ("Be the Match") reported that 15,000 people have registered for the national bone marrow registry since Good Morning America host Robin Roberts announced that she had MDS. That's four times the usual rate of new registrations. The publicity has clearly had a major impact in spreading the word about the need for bone marrow donors.

Meanwhile, MDS was in the celebrity news again. Screenwriter Nora Ephron died June 26, 2012 after her MDS advanced to AML. Ephron was known for her popular romantic comedies, including When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail, and Julie & Julia.

[Lisa Z]

It was really nice to read Marie's story in the AA/MDS insider issue, that I received in my e-mail. Her story is similar to mine, except Marie did the NIH Campath trial a year before me. She is a 4 year survivor, I am a 3 year MDS survivor. So, I 2nd her comment: Never give up!! There is always hope!

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Dr. Gail Roboz, a member of the AA&MDSIF Medical Advisory Board, will appear on ABC’s Good Morning America on Thursday, August 30th, 2012, to speak about MDS and Robin Roberts' upcoming bone marrow transplant.

Dr. Roboz was also featured in a segment with Diane Sawyer which aired on Monday, August 27 on ABC World News Tonight.

ABC News and many other media outlets have been reporting on MDS and bone marrow transplants since Robin Roberts announced that she had been diagnosed with MDS in June. ABC announced that it will continue following Robin’s journey.

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Photo from Good Morning America broadcast, February 20, 2013

Robin Roberts returned to ABC's Good Morning America television show on Wednesday April 20, 2013. She had said that she'd been looking forward to returning to her "home" on the set. Her hair may not have grown back completely but her familiar smile had already returned. As a well-known newscaster she set a good example for other patients with her "I'm going to beat this" attitude and willingness to share her story.

The broadcast marked exactly five months since her bone marrow transplant for MDS. She passed the hundred-day mark (what transplant patients refer to as Day +100) in December 2012 and by February 2013 had an OK from her doctors to return to work. She visited the ABC studio in January to ease back into her work routine.

Roberts' return attracted much attention. Representatives of the Aplastic Anemia & MDS International Foundation were outside when she arrived at the studio, to celebrate her return and cheer her on.

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Good Morning America announced on Twitter that Robin Roberts is writing a memoir covering her struggle with MDS.

The book and a corresponding audiobook are expected to be released in April 2014 by publisher Grand Central Publishing.

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Hear from Robin Roberts on her one-year transplant anniversary:

YouTube video