Hospital demand for blood products from the American Red Cross has recently increased, making it critically important that upcoming blood drives collect to their donation goal. Right now, blood and platelet donations are being distributed to hospitals as quickly as donations come in. Eligible donors of all blood types are urged to make an appointment to give as soon as possible to help ensure hospital patients have blood available to them when they need it.
We are in need of 30 more donors to sign up for the blood drive in order to meet our goal of 40 pints for this blood drive. Please consider donating blood at this time. Make an appointment online or by e-mailing Suzanne Neri at sdomanico@bcsd.neric.org.
Use Rapid Pass to speed up your donation time
Save some time on your donation this year by going to www.redcrossblood.org/rapidpass the day of the blood drive to complete your pre-reading materials and answer your health history questions prior to coming into the drive. On average, a donor who completes the rapid pass gets through the donation process in 31 minutes.
High-need blood types
Eligible donors with types O, B negative or A negative blood are especially needed (and encouraged to give double red cells, if available). During a double red cell donation, two units of red blood cells are collected while most of the plasma and platelets are returned to the donor. Type O negative is the universal blood type and what emergency personnel reach for in trauma situations when there isn’t time to determine a patient’s blood type. Type O positive is the most common blood type and can be transfused to Rh-positive patients of any blood type. Types A and B negative can be transfused to Rh-positive or negative patients.