A meeting of hearts if not minds between Jehovah's Witnesses and an atheist doctor

LOS ANGELES — Christina Blouvan-Cervantes had been battling aggressive leukemia when her blood count plummeted and she landed in the emergency room in Fresno, Calif. Her doctors told her a blood transfusion was her only hope. But her faith wouldn't allow her to receive one.

So she turned to one of the only doctors who could possibly keep her alive: a committed atheist who views her belief system as wholly irrational.

Dr. Michael Lill, head of the blood and marrow transplant program at Cedars-Sinai's Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, is a last recourse for Jehovah's Witnesses with advanced leukemia.

They arrive at Lill's door out of desperation and a desire to live. Many specialists decline to treat them because of their biblically centered refusal to accept blood transfusions, a mainstay of conventional care for the cancer.

Lill thinks their refusal is risky and illogical but nevertheless has devised a way to treat them that accommodates their religious convictions.

Despite his belief that God doesn't exist, he has become a hero to many devout believers.

"We don't care if he believes in God or not," said David Goldfarb, chairman of the Los Angeles-area Hospital Liaison Committee for the Jehovah's Witnesses. "What we really believe in is, 'Are you a skilled and great doctor ... and can you respect our belief system?'"

Lill, a 52-year-old Australia native, said ideological differences between doctor and patient are beside the point.

"Just because someone makes a decision which I would view as the wrong decision ... doesn't mean at that point in time I say, 'No, I am not going to look after you anymore,'" he said. "I try and treat people's religious beliefs with respect."

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Leukemia, a disease of the blood and bone marrow, produces cancerous blood cells. Treatment involves chemotherapy to destroy the cancerous cells, sometimes followed by transplants of stem cells that develop into healthy blood cells.

Blood transfusions are usually required, because both the cancer and the treatment suppress the body's production of blood cells. Without transfusions, the risk of death from anemia or bleeding is significantly higher.