It was less than five years ago that Dan Polischuk made his first blood donation but the Kitchener man is set to mark a milestone Tuesday when he gives blood for a 50th time.
Polischuk, who works at Wilfrid Laurier University, first donated blood on Dec. 27, 2018, after drawing inspiration from a newspaper article about a car crash he had read.
“There was a family that was really affected and needed a blood transfusion,” he explained. “I come from a tight-knit family and that really hit home for me. Next step is: if I were ever in that position, I’d want to be able to rely on those resources like blood to be able to get through that.”
Polischuk said the “it’s in you to give” tagline from Canadian Blood Services advertisements popped into his consciousness and he was off and running.
“I’ve always been one when I do something, I kind of go all in all the time,” he said. “So that’s why I’ve stuck with it all this time.”
In spite of his steadfast routine that followed the first of his 49 donations, he did not make his initial entrance into a donation centre with the idea of reaching any sort of milestones.
“It was just something that it was easy to do and I thought would be making at least a small impact,” Polischuk explained. “And hearing allot of the time, news reports coming through about how blood resources can get kind of low and desperate, it just kind of reinforced that I was doing the right thing.”
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