Evening Press Chief Reporter Mike Laycock has been told he is not needed as a bone marrow donor after all - at least for the time being.

Mike was one of 50 volunteers who went to an Anthony Nolan Bone Marrow Trust blood testing clinic at Wheldrake surgery on October 1.

The session was organised as part of the Race for a Donor campaign, backed by the Evening Press, to find a marrow donor for local leukaemia victim Nicola Coates.

The trust subsequently wrote to Mike, telling him he might be a match for someone needing a transplant and asking him to give two more blood samples. He went to his local surgery to get the samples taken, and posted them to the Trust.

He has now received a letter telling him that, unfortunately, following further testing of his blood at the trust's laboratories, he is not compatible.

But his details will remain on the register and he could still be called in to donate his marrow at any time over the next 15 years if he is found to be a match for someone else.

Mike was never told who the potential recipient in his case, but knows it was not Nicola.

A potential donor has been found for her in America, and she is set to undergo a transplant operation sometime early next year.

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