How can an important resource be always in short supply if everyone has some? What kind of resource is invaluable, but usually given freely? The answer is Life itself: Your blood. The Fantom Penguin met with Community Service Representative Megan Forrest of Shasta Blood Center in Redding.
"So, we're Shasta Blood Center, located in Redding. We're part of Blood Centers of the Pacific, which is based out of San Francisco. We were the first community based non-profit blood organization in the nation. We used to be located over on Athens and now we have a wonderfully new beautiful center on Larkspur."
"Most people just don't realize the importance of donating blood and what a community service it can be."
"It's important to the community because only 5% of the eligible population donates. Blood is used every two seconds for a patient, so there is a constant need for it and it's hard to keep up with demand."
That makes it necessary to have a blood drive every day.
"So, when you donate blood, typically you donate whole blood, which is three products, red blood cells, plasma and platelets but you can also donate each of those components on their own. So, you can do a whole blood donation (all three) or plasma, red blood cells or platelets. They're all used for different needs of patients."
"The red blood cells are used for trauma patients or patients having surgeries, blood loss, platelets for cancer, plasma for burn victims."
The Fantom Penguin asked if blood has a shelf life.
"Forty-two days for whole blood and then it's different for plasma and platelets. Platelets are really in need because it's only five days and two days is testing, so we have three days to find a patient for it."
"It does expire but in some cases, for instance O Negative blood, typically our shelves are empty by the middle of the day. We don't have any more to give our hospitals."
Why aren't more people donating blood?
"The restrictions are another reason that I think people are afraid to donate or don't donate is they think that they can't. I'm on this medication or I've done this and really the restrictions are not as tight as you may think. If you've had cancer in the past you can still donate. If you have diabetes you can still donate. If you are on certain medications you can still donate. So, for someone who thinks 'I can't donate because of . . . ', the best thing is to call your local blood center and ask."
"You have to be at least 16 years old and weigh 110 lbs. We have blood drives going every day of the week on our Bloodmobile and in different local communities and also our blood center is open six days a week."
"So when you donate blood, we take test tubes for testing and those test tubes are put on a plane that night to Arizona and they're tested for blood type. We also do free cholesterol testing for our donors and then 14 different diseases. So, all those tests have to be cleared before we can release the blood to a patient. The actual blood product, the bag of blood, goes back here to our lab where it's separated and stored until it's given to a hospital and released."
"If any testing that, you know . . . West Nile or Hepatitis or HIV, we let the donor know, of course."
"We also have an online donor profile for our donors which will track your cholesterol, your blood pressure, your pulse, your iron every time you donate, so it is kind of having like a mini health check for you. It's also supposed to have some benefits of donating, keeping your cholesterol a little bit lower. Your body is reproducing that blood that you donate immediately, so you're kind of changing your oil, I guess."
"There's different blood types for everybody. O Negative is the universal donor, so O Negative blood can be given to anybody and it's probably used the most but that doesn't mean that if you have A Positive, a common type, that that isn't also in need. For instance I have A Positive, but that means a lot of patients going into the hospital also have that type of blood. So while there are different types, O Negative probably being the one that's used the most, they're always in need -- all of them."
This publication once again assigned an "embedded reporter" as it has on other stories, only to discover that the Fantom Penguin's blood type is the same its mission statement: B Positive.
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