Life after the passing
of Alana Dung
IF you're in a hurry, don't ask Adelia C. (Chung) Dung, "So, 
what's new?" Given the extraordinary number and nature of projects she's got pending, the woman better known in Hawaii as the mother of Alana Dung will need lots of time to answer such a query.
Alana was the cute, leukemia-stricken toddler who inspired thousands of island residents to donate blood and sign up with the Hawaii Bone Marrow Registry in the mid-1990s.
The whole state rejoiced when a bone marrow match was found in Taiwan, and when the transplant was successfully completed on the mainland in the summer of '96.
A year later, when the cancer returned and claimed Alana's life, her family didn't retreat into obscurity. Still overwhelmingly grateful for the community's show of concern, Adelia and her husband, Stephen, started the Alana Dung Research Foundation to provide funding for medical study.
Since then, Adelia relates excitedly, the foundation has done much, including:
Generously funding the fledgling Hawaii Cord Blood Bank, which -- with the permission of parents -- collects and stores blood from the umbilical cords of newborns for patients needing a matching donor. According to Dr. Randy Wada, the now two-year-old Hawaii Cord Blood Bank is thriving. Especially exciting, he reveals in a recent newsletter, are preliminary research results showing a possible way to identify cord blood units that carry "genetic markers" associated with a resistance to HIV infection.
Agreeing to finance an annual visiting professorship at the University of Hawaii's John A. Burns School of Medicine, with the first participant to be Alana's doctor, Dr. Jean Sanders of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle. She will visit Hawaii four times a year to work with UH medical students, meet with local health professionals like Dr. Wada, and offer free check-ups to any transplant patient in the islands.
Lining up a remarkable program for its Saturday, Oct. 7 fund-raising dinner, "Dreams and Dragonflies -- Chapter 2," at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Tapa Ballroom. Featured will be Na Hoku Hanohano Award winner and acclaimed vocalist Keali'i Reichel, and a preview of songs from Lisa Matsumoto's musical play planned for next summer, "On Dragonfly Wings."
Sponsoring a bookmark creation contest, with the entries to be auctioned off at the Oct. 7 event and all proceeds to benefit the foundation. Art teachers: This could be a fun project for students. (For more information on the contest, which has a Sept. 25 deadline for entries, or on the aforementioned fund-raiser, call 591-8293.)
Oh, there's one more thing Adelia is excited about: This past March, she and her husband adopted Erin, a little girl from Zhongshan, Guangdong Province, China. Their lively 3-year-old just started preschool at Queen Emma, is well-adjusted and independent, and is especially close to her new brother, 11-year-old Spencer.
Ground-breaking medical research, a visiting professorship, gala fundraiser, bookmark contest and a child from China! Lots of things are new with Adelia Dung and family.
Diane Yukihiro Chang's column runs Monday and Friday.
She can be reached by phone at 525-8607, via e-mail at
dchang@starbulletin.com, or by fax at 523-7863.
