Timeline

We're proud of our history. Learn more about key milestones in our progress against leukemia and other blood diseases.

1990:
Peter Harf begins search to find a donor for his wife, Mechtild, who had acute leukemia. With no family matches, he gathered family, friends and volunteers to conduct donor drives, successfully recruiting 68,000 marrow donors.

1991:
Peter Harf and Professor Dr. Gerhard Ehninger, Peter's late wife's physician, establish DKMS or "Deutsche Knochenmarkspenderdatei" (German Bone Marrow Donor Center in English). The goal: to build a donor center to help more leukemia patients worldwide find their match.

1992:
DKMS facilitates 7 marrow transplants.

1996:
DKMS is the first marrow donor center in the world to use peripheral stem cell extraction.

1998:
DKMS facilitates more than 1,000 marrow transplants.

2004:
DKMS facilitates more than 7,500 marrow transplants; more than 25% were for U.S. patients.

2005:
Peter Harf co-founds DKMS Americas with his daughter, Katharina Harf, in New York City to build the registry and raise awareness in the U.S.

Today:
DKMS is the world's largest bone marrow donor center with more than 1.8 million registered donors and has facilitated more than 15,000 transplants.

Tomorrow:
DKMS aspires to reach the 2 million donor mark to help save the lives of more leukemia patients around the world.