Why You Should Donate Blood
... to burn patients and globulins, which can be useful in developing vaccines to disease like rabies, hepatitis B, and tetanus. Besides breaking blood into its component parts, there is another way that blood is classified. Each person in the world has blood that falls into one of several categories-- A, B, AB and O. Furthermore, each person is also considered to have a positive or negative blood type, known as a Rhesus factor. So you could be an A positive, A negative, B positive, B negative, AB positive AB negative, O positive, or O negative. There are specific rules about which blood types are compatible with other types. A person with a negative Rhesus factor cannot receive blood from someone with a positive factor. A person with Type O blood cannot receive blood from anyone except other Type O donors, but he or she can donate blood that can be used by almost any other blood type. That makes Type O donors the most rare and valuable ones, because their gift of life can be used wherever it is most needed. The website donate-blood.com lists how many units of blood are needed for various conditions. Those undergoing a liver transplant, for example, require 6-10 units of red blood cells, 20 units of plasma, and 10 units of platelets. Unfortunately, a typical blood donation session does not even produce one unit of each of the blood components. It produces one unit of red blood cells, but only one half unit of plasma and one sixth to one eighth of a unit of platelets. In other words, it will take the combined donations of as many as 80 people to meet the needs of just one patient during one liver operation. Someone undergoing one of the world’s most common procedures, heart surgery, requires an average of 2-6 units of red blood cells, 2-4 units of plasma, and 1-10 units of platelets. A leukemia patient needs 2-6 units of red blood cells, and 6-8 units of platelets daily for 2-4 weeks; a sickle cell patient will require 10-15 units of red blood cells. And those who suffer in automobile accidents will require anywhere from 4-40 units of red blood cells. When you consider that millions of patients are hospitalized each year for these conditions, you see how quickly blood supplies can run out. Altogether, there are 40 million red blood cell unit transfusions in the United States every year, and The National Blood Data Resource Center conducted a poll of hospitals in 2000 and determined that a whopping seven percent of American hospitals were forced to postpone surgery because of a shortage of blood. Indeed, even serious surgeries are often denied and lives lost because of a lack of blood. A recent U.S. News & World Report article featured a man who was the verge of death because of cirrhosis of the liver. He waited a year before a transplant became available. Enthusiastic, he accepted the hospital’s call and set out on the 80 mile journey which would save his life. Halfway there, his cell phone rang. Because of a lack of blood, he was told to turn around and go home. With resources already stretched thinly, you can see how venerable we are in the face of a threat such as terrorism or war. And even if we were to never face any type of large scale disaster, we are on our way to running out of blood as the American population ages. An older population is more likely to get cancer or require surgery and less likely to meet the health requirements to be eligible to donate. The baby boom generation has reached middle age, and for the rest of that generation’s lives, blood will continue to be scarce. III. How Donating Helps Yourself Now you know how donating blood helps other people. But how does it benefit you? First, you never know when you’re going to need blood, and you never know when your own donation will come back to help you. In some countries, anonymously donated blood is only used in emergencies. So if you want to schedule a surgery, you have to either donate the number of units of blood that you require or ask friends and relatives to donate for you. This really brings home the message that blood is a scarce resource and serves as a reminder to people of the importance of donating. Besides the obvious reason to donate-- that you might be donating to yourself in the event of an accident or unexpected illness-- there are other important reasons to give. First, you get the psychological satisfaction of knowing that you helped others. As humans, we all feel the need to help others. Most people go to church, contribute to charity, and give gifts to friends and families for their birthdays and holidays. We do kind things because we know that we can make the world a better place. There is no better way to make the world a better place than donating blood. This is the ultimate in good deeds. There is a second way that donating benefits the donor. Because all blood is screened for basic diseases such as Hepatitis and HIV, blood donors receive a sort of free check up. While blood banks urge donors not to donate solely for this reason and not to rely on the blood bank to catch and contact you about any problem with your blood, there is a certain amount of relief that comes with knowing that your blood is being tested for disease every time you donate. As if these were compelling enough reasons to donate, there are now studies that show that blood donation is actually healthy for you. Your body contains about four or five quarts of blood. When you donate, you usually lose about one pint of your five quarts. This requires that the bone marrow in your pelvis and skull, where new blood is produced, work to replenish your supply. This assures that the marrow stays active and that your body gets fresh blood. In men, the process of bleeding has been shown to be especially helpful for another reason. According to a new study, donating blood can cut the risk of heart attack in men by more than 50 percent, and reduce the risk of cancer as well! We have all heard that cholesterol is bad for the heart, but scientists now believe that cholesterol isn’t the killer that they once thought it was. As new cholesterol lowering drugs come into the marketplace, they are discovering that even when these rates are improved, men still die at massive rates from heart disease. Ironically, women tend to have far fewer heart problems and live much longer. The difference between the sexes, according to the new theory, is that men store excessive amounts of iron in their bodies which slowly eat away at the heart and other vital organs. After years of accumulating iron and suffering its toxic effects, the body is ravaged. There is only one practical way to reduce this-- regular bleeding. And other than volunteering to be a punching bag at the local gym, the best way to bleed is by donating blood. So the next time you hear a television ad advocating blood donation, remember that the slogan, “the life you save may be your own” applies to more than just the chance that you might receive your own blood following an accident. The actual act of donating may save your life. IV. How to Donate Now that you know how donating can help both others and yourself, how do you go about donating? The American Red ...