Blood donation - why is it used so far away!

[SillySausageSandwich]

Hi all,

Last week I donated blood. I’m a regular donor, have O+ blood (so fairly common)

Whenever I give blood my blood ends up getting used quite a long way away from me…. cities which are hours and hours away.

Does anyone know why it’s used so far away??

Logically it makes no sense to me.. why ship my blood all over the country! I’ve googled and it’s now answered my question so thought I’d ask on mumsnet!!

There's a national shortage of blood at the moment. Also if you blood has some special antibodies that someone else also has its better to have blood as near to the recipients as possible (it's called crossmatching). A lot more to it than just a positive or negative but that is the one we are taught.

I was abandoned mid-donation chat this week when a man who had been in front of me in the queue going in rushed back into the hall after leaving with his carton of juice with a huge bloodstain on his expensive work suit. About 8 people leapt into action, found him one of those tiny chairs which children sit on (all that was available) and by the time I had finished he was being tended by two nurses, being made a hot drink by a third, while someone else tried to find him a t-shirt to replace his ruined shirt. First time I've ever seen someone who wouldn't stop bleeding!

How do you know where it goes?

@Misthios wow!!! I bet that was dramatic… really shows how good the nurses are!

My mum was told to stop after she wouldn’t stop bleeding and ended up with a huge bruise (really upset her… she’s a O- …. I’ve told her to be super careful with the current shortage, if she has an accident she wouldn’t have a lot of blood group choices!)

It was dramatic, never seen anything like that before and I was in the bed nearest where it was all happening so had a ringside seat. The guy was more embarrassed than anything, they did manage to stop the bleeding after about 5 minutes of pressure. I have had one donation where it took longer to stop the bleeding than usual, it must be a very everyday thing for them though.

I have also seen someone faint, it was a group of 3 lads in school uniform and one of them got up from the bed after donating and went down on the floor, his mates thought it was super funny that everyone was fussing over him, he was mortified.

I gave blood recently in London and it was used in Newport. I think it's because my blood is really special and wonderful 😇

In England you get a text telling you.

I’ve just scrolled through mine, I’m SE England. Mine have gone all over southern England from Cornwall to Sussex and quite a few to the Midlands, the furthest has been Liverpool and 4 lots have gone to the same hospital. I’m booked in again next week, made the appointment months ago.

When you donate it goes to one of 3 processing centres in England, from their it is then requested by users all over the country.

so it’s probably that those hospitals are linked to your processing centre.

One of my friends is a haematology consultant and I asked her about this as a friend was going to have an operation and has a rare blood type. This was about 15 years ago so it may have changed. And I'd had a couple of glasses of wine so may have misremembered.
Apparently, if you are a donor and have a rare blood type, it gets taken to the central base in Liverpool and then, if a hospital is expecting to need a rare blood type, then contact the central base and it gets couriered to them on a motorbike. Otherwise, the blood just goes to the "local" screening place (I say local but there were only 8 or so of them in the country) and then gets sent from there to whichever hospital has low stocks. As there is no way of predicting how much blood you'll need and when, this changes frequently.

Oh, and one of my friends has a rare blood type. She donates regularly anyway but will sometimes get a text specific to her asking if she can donate. For example, last year was she scheduled to give blood in September which was a longer gap for her than allowed but worked for her due to the school holidays. A week before her next safe date to donate, she got a message saying we know you're due to donate on X date but we really need your blood and can you come to any of these venues on these dates and those dates were on the day or the days after that it became safe to donate. So off she went... which is very annoying as we used to donate at the same time and now we're out of sync!

Awww!

It will be…. It will probably make someone (maybe 3 people) feel wonderful too.

@thehousewiththesagegreensofa that is annoying!! I was talking to a woman at my last donation who always donates with her sister.. they enjoy the regular catch up over dilute juice and bourbon biscuits!

My mum used to get ‘summoned’…. She’s O-, so rare and useful. I’m less rare, O+ but a few donations ago they said I’m CMV negative which makes my blood slightly more desirable for people with compromised immune systems… which is nice.

Only if you donate in England. Wales has its own blood service.

Just had the message to say mine has been sent to a hospital 200 miles away from me. I have blood that goes to neonatal units gets lots of tags on it when I donate, so I always feel a little warm and fuzzy to see the message it's arrived safely for use somewhere. Glad to help.

@Slightlydustcovered aww you’re super special, Neo blood is really rare!! I e never even seen a donor with a tag on their bag!

It does make me a little bit sad that a little baby needs blood though.