Georgetown: Although plagued with a constant acute shortage of blood, some Ministry of Health’s blood donation sites have on occasions been forced to turn away voluntary donors. This development according to Director of Regional Health Services, Dr Narine Singh, does not by any means that blood is not needed but rather the donors at hand do not have the blood types that are required by the blood bank.
Donors can have blood types ranging from AB, A positive, A negative, B positive, D negative, O positive and O negative. However according to Dr Singh, “sometimes when you come to donate blood and we have an overstock of one particular group and we can’t take it because we don’t need your type and some people might think we don’t really need blood.”
Failure on the part of the blood bank to accept blood is due to the fact that drawing and storing blood is an expensive process, according to Minister of Health, Dr Bheri Ramsaran, who sought to point out that “when you take the blood from the donor it has to be stored in bags and, chemicals are in that bag prepared under certain sterile conditions in a factory specially created for that purpose.” Additionally, he noted that since blood cannot be stored beyond a specific period it would be remiss on the part of the blood bank to store an excess of one particular blood type especially when there is need for another type.
A single unit of blood, according to Dr Singh is not immediately used for transfusion but rather it is first separated into three different components, including: Packed Red blood cells which can be kept up to 45 days and plasma which is the liquid part of the blood that can be extracted, frozen and kept for up to about 120 days. Another component is the cryoprecipitate from which two or three children can benefit. “When you come forward and donate blood voluntarily this is an important step you are taking…The lives of three other persons could be saved with a single unit, their lives could very well be dependent on your voluntary donation,” according to Minister Ramsaran.
Recent appeals by the Ministry has seen members of the public responding well, he noted, adding that “we have reached a state of national consciousness that about 70 per cent of all the blood we receive come from voluntary donors who walk in off the streets to our facilities and say please take my blood to help another person.”
At the moment the Ministry of Health has five fixed blood transfusion sites which members of the public can access. These include the National blood Transfusion Service (NBTS) which is located in the Georgetown Public Hospital Compound, the West Demerara Regional Hospital, the Suddie, Linden and New Amsterdam Hospitals. Persons according to Dr Singh can visit these locations Monday through Friday to donate blood. However, donations are not limited to these facilities as according to Dr Singh the Ministry can make available a mobile unit, upon request, which can be taken to locations where there are no fixed sites, providing that substantial donations will be made.
And in order to reach the World Health Organisation recommended 100 per cent voluntary donation, efforts are being made to solicit the support of corporate bodies, according to Minister Ramsaran. He is also optimistic that church, sports, Government Ministries and other large groups would seek to support the Health Ministry by voluntary donating blood. “We are hoping that these bodies can help us by mobilizing their people and inviting our mobile unit to come to their premises.”
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