I’m not going to give a whole PSA in favor of blood donation (which is not to say that I won’t be writing one in the future). Suffice it to say that I am in favor of it! When I lived in Binghamton, I was in the donation office so often that I knew all of the technicians by name. Unfortunately, the reason I was in there so much was because I almost always failed my test for iron levels. But, undaunted, I would come back week after week for as long as it took before I was able to donate. To give you an idea of how much it was: I was only about to donate about three times in a year!
Anyway, the point is that I’m dedicated to blood donation! Since I donated right before I left Binghamton, today was my first donation since coming to Boston. I went to the center at 276 Tremont (soon to be relocating) and everyone was very nice. After how much I loved the Johnson City staff, I was nervous that their shoes would be too big to fill, but apparently the Red Cross only employs extremely nice people. I can tell that this staff and I will be BFFs soon.
The woman taking my vitals let me know that the area has a critical need for platelets and asked if I would consider platelet donation. Your typical blood donation (what they call “whole blood”) only takes 15 minutes or so, but platelet donation is quite different and takes several hours. The needle that they put in your arm looks the same, but it’s actually connected to two tubes that are connected to an apheresis machine. The blood gets taken out of your arm and goes into the machine where a centrifuge spins it around really fast. The components of the blood are separated by density and the desired part (in my case, platelets) is filtered out The rest of your blood is pumped back into your vein through the same needle. Pretty cool!
I had never donated platelets before, but since I passed the iron test, and I didn’t have any pressing appointments, I decided to give it a try. My honest assessment: I will do it again, but it’s not my favorite feeling in the world. Because they’re taking your blood out, running it through a machine and then putting it back into your vein, they add an anticoagulant to prevent clotting. The side effect is that it makes you feel really cold. Naturally, they warned me about this ahead of time, but I guess the unseasonably warm weather made me forget how much I hate being cold! Blech! The feeling was really pervasive and made me groggy, whereas I normally feel fine after a whole blood donation.
On the plus side, they gave me several blankets to snuggle in, hot from the dryer, and all the snacks I could eat. The staff kept checking on me to make sure I didn’t need anything. They set up a TV for me to watch a movie (I chose Blazing Saddles). The entire appointment from the time I walked in to the time I walked out was about three hours, but the time passed pretty quickly. The needle they used seemed normal: a sharp pinch at first, but then you hardly feel it (though you can’t move your arm for a long time). I also has a little bit of cramping in my legs, but they fixed me right up by giving me some Tums to chew on. Next time they’ll give it to me beforehand to ward off cramps before they start.
Your blood regenerates much faster after platelet donation than whole blood, so I’ll be able to donate again in two weeks. I have a feeling it will go much better this time, since I’ll know what to expect.
For Science! 