Donate: Blood
IF you get the chance, go out and donate blood.
Last week, I found myself in what felt like a wild goose chase looking for four units of A+ blood. We took my dad to the hospital after a very serious ulcer attack that caused a lot of internal bleeding. With all the blood loss, we needed to replace the lost blood STAT.
Nothing is more nerve-racking than finding out the medical center’s blood bank did not have available blood units. And nothing makes you blow a fuse more than to be asked “please look for blood immediately” and to top it all off, the hospital’s blood bank could not perform blood screening for potential donors—we had to go to the city for that.
I think I’ve watched so many episodes of ER and Grey’s Anatomy that I assumed hospitals would help look for blood units. But it’s nothing like what you see on the medical dramas.
You look for blood yourself, run on adrenaline, and cry in the backseat of a taxi cab. And while I understand how stressed out and busy our local healthcare centers are, I do wish there was a centralized database of all available blood units in the region that all hospitals could have access to. It would make finding blood so much easier.
Nothing makes me more thankful to have the Philippine National Red Cross around. After several attempts of trying to find blood (and demanding for a list of Blood Banks in Cebu from our medical center where we are staying, since you don’t get that kind of information unless you ask), the Red Cross had the blood units we needed available. No fuss, just a few calls and quick coordination, and we could pick up the blood units immediately.
Their blood bank in Cebu City had only two blood units available out of the four we needed. The two other units we later found at the Philippine National Red Cross Blood Station in Mandaue City (it’s a newly opened facility!).
The staff of the Red Cross were nothing but accommodating and super quick to respond in helping us find blood units in their different blood stations in Cebu.
While at the Red Cross Mandaue Blood Station, I met a father who was frantically looking for blood for his seven-year-old daughter who was down with dengue. The blood station did not have the blood units that they required. He didn’t know where else to go. I handed him the list of blood banks in Cebu which he could call. I wish others out there who are looking for blood could have the same access to these very important numbers.
In our quest for blood, I realize that blood units are not always readily available. Centralized data of its availability in all blood banks in the region is not readily available to healthcare centers and the public. By simply knowing where a blood unit is, it could easily lessen the coordination time and save lives.
If you’re healthy and up to saving lives, go to to the Red Cross and donate some blood. You can save a life with your blood donation. The Red Cross supplies approximately one-fourth of the country’s national blood requirements. You can help.
My dad is still in the hospital and we may still need blood should the bleeding reoccur. I’m pretty sure that there are hundreds out there who are also in dire need of blood now.
If you could please go and save a life, go and donate blood. Every donation counts.