Sant Cugat student survives bone-marrow transplant

Gerard Osete, a 21-year-old university student from Sant Cugat del Vallès, received a bone-marrow transplant from his brother Ferran in November 2025 after doctors diagnosed him with aplastic anemia, according to an interview published by ElNacional.cat on May 24. Osete told the outlet he had begun feeling increasingly tired in August 2025, then developed bruising, bleeding and pallor before collapsing while out walking his dog. Hospital tests first raised the possibility of leukemia, the report said, but a later bone-marrow study showed his marrow had stopped producing blood cells. A little more than six months after the transplant, he was “almost fully recovered,” ElNacional.cat reported. Hospital de Sant Pau in Barcelona said on May 21 that it has performed more than 4,000 bone-marrow transplants since carrying out Spain’s first such procedure in 1976. The hospital said that record has helped establish the center as one of Europe’s longest-running and most internationally recognized hematopoietic transplant programs. Sant Pau marked the 50th anniversary of that first transplant on May 22, 2026. (elnacional.cat) ### How did Gerard Osete’s illness first appear? August 2025 was when Osete began noticing that something was wrong, according to ElNacional.cat. The report said the avid sports enthusiast first attributed his fatigue to summer heat, but then saw bruises appear easily, bled heavily from cuts and looked unusually pale. A later episode in which he fainted prompted hospital evaluation. (santpau.cat) Aplastic anemia was the diagnosis later confirmed, ElNacional.cat reported. The Josep Carreras Foundation defines the condition as a disease in which red bone marrow disappears and the body stops producing red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets. The foundation says hematopoietic stem-cell transplantation, commonly called a bone-marrow transplant, is used mainly to treat blood diseases including leukemias and lymphomas, and in some cases other severe hematologic disorders. (elnacional.cat) ### Why was his brother the donor? Ferran Osete was the donor in Gerard Osete’s case, according to ElNacional.cat. Gerard told the outlet that his brother dislikes hospitals but agreed immediately to donate. The transplant took place in November 2025. Dr. Javier Briones, director of Sant Pau’s Hematology Service, said in the hospital’s anniversary statement that every transplant begins with “a person” who decides altruistically to donate bone-marrow cells to help someone else. (elnacional.cat) Sant Pau used the anniversary to link current patients with the wider donor system that underpins transplant medicine. ### Why does Sant Pau keep coming up in this story? May 22, 1976 was the date of Spain’s first bone-marrow transplant, and Sant Pau said the procedure was performed there by a team from its hematology and pediatrics services. The patient was a 13-year-old girl with acute leukemia who had relapsed after chemotherapy, and the donor was her identical twin sister, the hospital said. Sant Pau said the patient was discharged three weeks later in complete remission. (santpau.cat) Dr. Andreu Domingo Albós led that pioneering team, Sant Pau said. The hospital also named Dr. Josep Cubells and Dr. Isabel Badell among the clinicians involved. Sant Pau said the 1976 procedure helped launch hematopoietic transplantation in Spain at a time when the technique was still highly experimental worldwide. (santpau.cat) ### What exactly is a bone-marrow transplant treating here? The Josep Carreras Foundation says a hematopoietic progenitor transplant replaces diseased or nonfunctioning blood-forming cells with healthy ones. In Osete’s case, ElNacional.cat said his marrow was effectively empty, leaving him unable to produce the blood cells his body needed. That made transplant the treatment doctors pursued. (santpau.cat) Sant Pau said the procedure that was experimental in 1976 is now an essential therapeutic tool for many leukemias, lymphomas, myelomas, immunodeficiencies and other severe blood disorders. Dr. Irene Garcia, a hematology specialist at Sant Pau quoted by ElNacional.cat, said advances since the 1970s have been substantial. (elnacional.cat) ### What happens next at Sant Pau? Sant Pau said its 50th-anniversary events in May 2026 were designed to highlight the hospital’s transplant history and the role of donors, clinicians and patients in the program’s development. The hospital directed readers to anniversary sessions and related program information through its event materials. Gerard Osete, meanwhile, told ElNacional.cat he was nearly fully recovered a little more than half a year after his transplant from Ferran. (santpau.cat)