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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 15, 2007
DAYTON, OH — (Thursday, February 15, 2007) Community Blood Center (CBC) registered 427 donors and collected 319 usable pints of blood yesterday despite a winter storm that made driving hazardous and led to the cancellation of blood drives. CBC was able to schedule several emergency blood drives at four hospitals and the University of Dayton. Donors heeded the call for help after CBC announced that it had asked area hospitals to defer elective surgeries until Friday that might require transfusions in an effort to conserve blood supplies for trauma and emergency patients.
“The hospitals continue to perform urgent cases, but have been very cooperative in deferring elective cases. Even so, patients used 217 units of red cells yesterday,” stated Judith E. Woll, MD, chief executive officer at CBC. “A lot of caring people in our service area donated yesterday and some of them had to wait for quite awhile. Students at the University of Dayton waited as long as four hours to give blood. I want to thank those donors and our staff members who braved conditions to get to work. Some of our collections staff did not leave for home until after 11:00 last night. ”
CBC has cancelled blood drives today in Greenville, Wilmington, and Bellefontaine due to poor road conditions. The blood drive in Farmersville at the Farmersville United Church of Christ, 44 S. Broadway St., from 3:00 to 8:00 p.m. will take place as scheduled. CBC has scheduled emergency blood drives at three area hospitals (Kettering Medical Center, Grandview Hospital and Sycamore Hospital) for employees and patient families and again at the University of Dayton for students. The general public is asked to donate at one of our donor centers in Dayton, Middletown, Springfield, West Chester and Richmond, IN. For more information on branch hours and exact locations, visit: http://www.cbccts.org/donating/centers.htm. All CBC branch locations will be open this Saturday morning.
The area blood supply is 942 pints or 24% low. Types O and A are critically needed. Blood collected yesterday will not be available for transfusion until tomorrow when all test results will be available. This is only the second time in the 43 years since the blood center opened in 1964 that CBC has requested that elective surgeries be cancelled due to a low blood supply.
For more information, call 1-800-388-GIVE or visit www.cbccts.org.
Please note: CBC no longer requires donors to provide their social security number when they register to donate. Donors are required to provide a photo ID that includes their full name. Past CBC donors are also asked to bring their CBC donor ID card. Donors must be at least 17 years of age, weigh a minimum of 110 pounds, and be in good physical health. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) changes blood donor eligibility guidelines periodically. Individuals with eligibility questions are invited to email canidonate@cbccts.org or call 1-800-388-GIVE.
Community Blood Center/Community Tissue Services™, an independent, not-for-profit organization, is registered to ISO 9001:2000. Community Blood Center provides blood products to 25 hospitals in the Miami (Ohio) and Whitewater (Indiana) Valleys. For more information about Community Blood Center/Community Tissue Services™, visit www.cbccts.org.
Please call the center nearest you to make an appointment.
Copyright 2005 Community Blood Center
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