Provide us list of blood donors, MRC Kuching asks SGH blood bank

KUCHING: The Kuching Chapter of Malaysian Red Crescent ( MRC) is appealing to Sarawak General Hospital ( SGH) to provide it a full list of blood donors in Sarawak.

Its chairman Datuk Dr Abang Abdul Rauf Abang Zen said the list is to facilitate MRC Kuching Chapter in updating its database so as to extend its appreciation to blood donors.

“We have requested the blood bank of SGH to provide us the information but they refused to do so, reasoning that the information should remain confidential.

“This is quite disappointing because what we want is just information about blood donors in Sarawak who have bled to help save lives,” he said at a press conference here yesterday.

It is understood that the required list is meant for the chapter to hand out certificates of appreciation to blood donors, during a ceremony to be held at Crown Towers here on Oct 27.

According to Abang Abdul Rauf, MRC Kuching Chapter keeps a list of blood donors in its system that can only be accessed by on- duty officers.

To- date, the chapter has 73,000 active blood donors.

“We need the information of other blood donors as well and only the blood bank of SGH can help us complete our records in the system,” he said.

We have requested the blood bank of SGH to provide us the information but they refused to do so, reasoning that the information should remain confidential. This is quite disappointing because what we want is just information about blood donors in Sarawak who have bled to help save lives. Datuk Dr Abang Abdul Rauf Abang Zen, Kuching Chapter of Malaysian Red Crescent chairman

As such, he appealed to the blood bank to cooperate and provide the chapter with a full list so that no blood donor is left out.

He said Sarawak won five awards at the National Blood Donation Campaign 2017 ceremony in Kota Kinabalu last year.

Among the awards, he said Sarawak brought home the award for ‘ Most Collected Blood’ at 38,642 pints, while Ismail Ibrahim won the individual category for donating a total of 137 pints of blood.

Abang Abdul Rauf said the state can keep up its good work and continue its mission of helping others through blood donation.