Volunteers approach the American Red Cross from many different directions. Mike DeSantis came through donating blood. And then doing it again, and again, and again. He wanted to start donating blood while he was in high school, but was born too late in the year, so he had to wait until he turned 18 when he was in college before his first visit.
“I gave whole blood then, and found it wasn’t all that hard or that intimidating,” Mike said. “After a few times at the local blood center, a nurse asked me if I had considered apheresis and told me I had nice big veins.”
That was the beginning of something that blossomed into a decades-long relationship. By one accounting, he has donated more than 530 units of platelets over 375 visits. He tries to come in every other Friday afternoon. “This is a lot easier to remember than the whole blood schedule,” he said.
It does take more time to do apheresis versus a whole blood or power red (double whole blood) donation: a typical apheresis volunteer will take at least two hours to go through the process as an apheresis machine is needed. In addition, you have two needles: one to draw the whole blood, the other to put the red cells and plasma back in your body after the apheresis machine separates the platelets. That means DeSantis has spent the equivalent of a month sitting in a blood center. He has gotten used to his routine. “You expect to feel something from a needle, but half the time I fall asleep during the donation.”
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