Dec 10, 2007 - 05:41:46 CST
During the holidays, people are busy with vacations and family, purchasing gifts while there are still patients in need of the most important gift of all - the gift of life, the donation of someone else's blood.United Blood Services estimates that 60 percent of the population will be in need of blood or blood components at some point in their lives. Only one in 20 people regularily donate blood. United Blood Services of Bismarck sees an average of 200 volunteers per day, but around the holidays, this number drastically reduces.
"We probably get about 100 donors a day during December," United Blood Services donor recruitment manager Dessie Baxter said. "The weather and the holidays make it tough to get the 300 units a day that we need."
United Blood Services of Bismarck was scrambling on Tuesday to find volunteers to reach the quota for the day because its Fargo counterpart had to cancel all of its mobiles due to poor weather conditions. Bismarck had to make up for the units Fargo was unable to collect by calling coordinators at the mobiles and making extra phone calls to recruit extra donors.
"If we say we need blood because of a situation and say it's urgent, then it's true because we don't put out an urgent message often," Baxter said.
Mobiles serve to make the 1-pint blood donations of volunteers convenient, as do the various blood drives held at high schools, colleges and businesses. These events are vitally important, especially around the holidays.
"We try to put events together that make it a little more exciting for people to go in and donate,"Baxter said. "Starting (this week) we'll have thank-you gifts for people who come to donate."
Baxter said that due to the slippery road conditions and last-minute surgeries scheduled before insurance ends and deductibles restart, the need for blood increases at the end of the year. However, due to closed businesses and holiday vacation, the blood collection diminshes during December. The week between Christmas and New Year's day has the fewest volunteers each year, so United Blood Services of Bismarck is hosting a New Year's Eve party, providing games, apple cider an d snacks for those donating.
Anybody who is at least 17 years old, weighs a minimum of 110 pounds and is in good health is eligible to donate blood. The blood is separated into components and sent in test tubes to the corporate office in Arizona to be screened for HIV, hepatitis B and C, HTLV, West Nile virus, Chagas' disease and syphilis. United Blood Services receives the results of the tests in their computer system the next day and the blood donations are distributed to Bismarck's hospitals to patients in need.
"This time of year is difficult with the flu season," Baxter said, "but we have a lot of dedicated donors. We're very fortunate."
Regular donors can donate up to six times a year, some donating up to 50 gallons of blood over the course of their donating history.
"We depend on the regulars 100 percent because, without them, we'd have nothing," Baxter said. "We have to have them in order to help the patients."
(Samantha Stockman is a senior at Century High School.)
Donor wrote on Dec 11, 2007 11:36 PM:
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