Giving Blood

I donate blood to the Red Cross every 56 days or so, sometimes I go a little more. Today in St Louis the Cardinals baseball team were sponsoring the blood drive at a local recreation center. I went as always to donate blood and since my wife is a huge fan she got to meet one of the players (McClellan or something) and get a T-Shirt. He was real cool and took a pic with her and signed the shirt, which made her happy.:daydream:

During the blood drawing my vein stopped giving up blood, so they turned and twisted it to get it going again without success. They had it too deep and I could feel it hitting lots of things besides my vein. They had to pull it out and asked if they could do the other arm instead. I obliged and they were nearing the end and it stopped again!

They asked my permission to restick the other arm again in a different spot to get the last little out and I said yes. Because without having all of the blood properly they would have to toss my donation all together.

The lady started to prep my 3rd spot and told me to squeeze the ball to get my vein to pop. They hadn't fully gauzed the first spot and when I pumped the ball my blood sprayed out!!:eek:

You should have seen they're faces! I was grabbing paper towels and holding it down while the blood poured out all over my arm and hand. :DI laughed the whole time, and I'm sure from a distance I looked like a complete psycho.

Anyway I did finally finish and get the right amount of donation out and I'm fine. Well, except for a bit of bruising.

It was just really funny and I had to share.

Lol trust me, if it's the first time it's happened to them, it won't be the last. Just try to make sure you are well hydrated when you go, that should help. :) ( I used to do that for a living)

I'd love to donate but I am not allowed. When my Dad was Air Force we spent '83 to '91 stationed in the UK and they had that whole Mad Cow thing going on and the US government used local beef to supply the commissaries instead of shipping across the pond. So potentially I could of gotten Mad Cow infected meat. They don't know if you can get it that way and the only test right now is to slice my head open and look at the brain (ain't happening):eek::eek:

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Originally Posted by TheGreatSatan

I donate blood to the Red Cross every 56 days or so, sometimes I go a little more.

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I think you're only legally allowed to do it 4 times a years over here!

The blood bank I'm a member of, I think it's a max of once every 56 days or so, or twice that if you do their new...somethingphoresis..somethingsomething..inste ad of just taking out whole blood and being done with it, they take it out, separate out the red blood cells, keep those, and put everything else back it. It takes about twice as long, but they get twice as many red blood cells and it takes less of a toll on your system. Feels really weird though, because when they put it back in it's cold (room temp in an air-conditioned building), and it takes a while for it to warm back up to body temp...so you can feel it flowing back through your system. Very strange sensation, that, especially when it gets to your heart. They'll only ask certain blood types to do it though, I think A and O. Gotta love us O's. :P

O+ FTW!

I used to give blood many moons ago and then go drinking afterward. It was a cheap buzz since you didn't have to drink that much to get tipsy.

Now they don't let me give blood since I am exposed to poison oak at my house.

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Originally Posted by x88x

The blood bank I'm a member of, I think it's a max of once every 56 days or so, or twice that if you do their new...somethingphoresis..somethingsomething..inste ad of just taking out whole blood and being done with it, they take it out, separate out the red blood cells, keep those, and put everything else back it. It takes about twice as long, but they get twice as many red blood cells and it takes less of a toll on your system. Feels really weird though, because when they put it back in it's cold (room temp in an air-conditioned building), and it takes a while for it to warm back up to body temp...so you can feel it flowing back through your system. Very strange sensation, that, especially when it gets to your heart. They'll only ask certain blood types to do it though, I think A and O. Gotta love us O's. :P

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I think that's donating just the plasma, which I still can't do:(, there's a company down in Cheyenne called BioLife that does the same thing and they pay you $20 each time you go. And because its just the plasma you can donate like 10 times a month. If I could of done it I know where my modding budget would have been coming from. ;)

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Originally Posted by Bopher

I think that's donating just the plasma, which I still can't do:(, there's a company down in Cheyenne called BioLife that does the same thing and they pay you $20 each time you go. And because its just the plasma you can donate like 10 times a month. If I could of done it I know where my modding budget would have been coming from. ;)

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Actually it's the other way around. Plasma is the stuff that the blood cells float around in, and is (iirc) universally swappable, no matter what your blood type. It's the red blood cells that have the markers on them (A, B, +) that prompt rejection in people with incompatible blood types. So, they can get plasma from anyone, but getting the actual red blood cells is more of a problem for some patients, which I'm guessing is why they started doing this. It pulls twice the red blood cells as normal, but they require waiting twice as long between donations (~104 days, iirc).

Oops. Got it all backwards. I think I'll stick with computers and leave medicine to the pros.:)

Yep, you can donate whole blood, platelets, or plasma. The plasma wasn't worth the money. It took a couple of hours and they pull it out, separate it then put it back in real cold and painful. A process called Apheresis, I think pulls out the blood and separates it and they keep them both.