Avry Jo Schapansky and her family rang the bell at Dell Children's Blood and Cancer Center on Aug. 7, marking the end of her cancer treatment. (Jessica McLaren/Community Impact)
Five-year-old Avry Jo Schapansky rang the bell at Dell Children's Blood and Cancer Center on Aug. 7, marking the end of her cancer treatment and her place as the first patient in Central Texas to complete a stem cell transplant through the hospital's new program.
The details
Referred to as both a bone marrow and a stem cell transplant, the procedure involves replacing a patient's damaged bone marrow with healthy stem cells, administered through an IV, according to previous CommunityImpact reporting. Stem cells form blood and immune cells and are found in bone marrow; high doses of chemotherapy needed to fight the cancer can also destroy a patient's healthy bone marrow and stem cells in the process.
Once transplanted, the new stem cells travel to the bone marrow and begin producing healthy blood cells, helping restore the patient's immune system and clear the remaining cancer.
Schapansky underwent tandem stem cell transplants—two performed back-to-back—as part of her roughly year-and-a-half treatment plan, which also included:
Five cycles of induction chemotherapy and immunotherapy
Surgery
Radiation
Five additional cycles of immunotherapy
The treatment also required multiple hospitalizations and infectious complications along the way, Cohn said.
“I know there’s a lot of really big hospitals, but the thing is here, you get really personalized care,” Schapansky’s parents said at the ceremony.
Dell Children's Medical Center in Central Austin launched Central Texas' first pediatric stem cell transplant program in August 2025. (Jessica McLaren/Community Impact)
Why it matters
Before Dell Children Medical Center launched its stem cell program in August 2025, patients needing this level of care had to be referred to hospitals outside Austin, according to previous CommunityImpact reporting.
Avry Jo was the first patient to need a transplant after the program became ready, and Cohn said her family's decision to stay reflected trust in a brand-new team.
"We value their trust and faith in us as a new transplant program within our established hospital," Cohn said.
Cohn, who treated Avry Jo throughout her cancer journey, described the emotional weight of reaching this milestone.
"To see them come through the cancer journey whole again as a family, and stronger than ever, just fills me with such relief and pride," Cohn said.
Something to note
Dell Children's stem cell program was made possible in part through a gift from the Shivers Cancer Foundation, which established the Arthur H. Dilly Endowed Chair in Pediatric Oncology at Dell Medical School—funding that helped recruit Dr. Amir Mian to lead the program. Community donations through Dell Children's HERE Campaign also supported the program's launch.
The hospital partners with We Are Blood, a nonprofit blood center, to collect and store harvested stem cells, according to previous CommunityImpact reporting. After a patient's cells are harvested, they're frozen at We Are Blood until the patient is admitted for transplant.
"We Are Blood is proud to have played a key role in assisting the first pediatric stem cell collection in Central Texas to support Dell Children's Medical Center's historic bone marrow transplant program," said April Tiller in March.
What's next
Dell Children’s has two additional transplants planned in the near future, Cohn said.
The pediatric hospital is also aiming to begin offering CAR T-cell therapy and gene therapy in 2026, Mian said, adding that patients previously had to leave Central Texas to receive these services. The program's technology could eventually extend to treating autoimmune diseases, metabolic disorders and sickle cell disease.
