Benefits of blood donation
Are you ready for blood transfusion?
We celebrate World Blood Donor Day on 14 June every year, with objectives to raise awareness of the need for safe blood and blood products and to thank voluntary unpaid blood donors for their life-saving gifts of blood. Blood donation is a simple and safe procedure. Any healthy adult between 18 to 60 years old can donate blood. It has been said,that a single blood donation can save 3 lives.
As we all know,normal healthy adult blood volume is about 5-6 litres. Each blood component has its own life-span..Red blood cells~ 120days, WBC~13-20days and platelets~ 8-10days..Our normal & actively functioning bone marrow keeps on working producing all these new components day by day,without us even realize it. Thanks God for our healthy marrow and effective body mechanism. So,during each session of blood donation,only about 500ml blood is withdrawn (in simple math,there's still balance of another 4500ml blood in your body system..this does not make so much difference to your blood volume right?). Our body soon will replace all the blood that we donate.
Having aware that blood transfusion can save lives and improve health,we should not be hesitate to donate blood. We need more volunteers to come forward to donate blood to those unlucky ones. Blood donation is a voluntary act of allowing one's blood to be drawn out of body. It has many advantages besides giving that wonderful feeling of saving someone's life. The blood donated will be screened and processed in the blood banks. Only safe blood will be released and used for blood transfusion.
Blood donation itself does not do any harm to your body, instead it is very helpful in maintaining our healthy body. There are several benefits of blood donation to the donor himself:
1) The Kansas University Medical Center found that men who participate in blood donation experience 30% fewer incidence of heart disease and stroke compared to those people who did not donate blood
2) In 1998 American Journal of Epidemiology published that blood donation can reduce the overall iron levels in blood,which may protect against heart attack [but,this applies to people who had high iron in iron in their blood to begin with] Study has shown that high iron levels in the blood may thicken blood and increase free-radical damage to body organ.
3)Blood donation forces your body and bone marrow to be more active in order to replace the lost blood with fresh new cells
4)Men do not have menstrual period,therefore they store more iron in their bodies and often it's more than what they need
5)Most blood donation sites have medical staffs to check your heart rate,blood pressure,weight and hemoglobin etc prior to blood donation for free. So you can consider this as your regular medical check-ups.
6)You can hardly lose blood because average adult has about 5 litres of total blood, we donate just 1/10 of it. Giving blood does not decrease your body strength. Some centers even will give you snacks and drinks after blood donation session to restore and boost your energy.
7) In Malaysia in particular, you'll be given one personal donation book & every session will be recorded there. You will be granted rewards in the form of free outpatient services & ward-hospital stay, free Hepatitis B injection etc [in case if u need any of them in the future] depends on the number of sessions you did.
8) In every religion,i believe that our Creator advised us to do good deeds while we are still alive in this world. Thus blood donation can be considered as an act of charity thus we will be blessed by God in this world and thereafter.
Many people still have misconceptions about blood donation and afraid to donate their blood. Actually,nothing to be scared of. Please correct your misconceptions and consult the right person or your doctors regarding blood donation for better info.
1) Blood donation is nearly pain free procedure. A single prick won't kill you
2) You will not get HIV/AIDS or other blood-related diseases by donating blood. Staffnurses are using sterile needle and equipment for blood donation process
3) Blood donation does not have anything to do with your appetite. No weight-gain issue here. Do not blame blood donation for any increase in appetite after donation. Instead, with every pint of blood donated, people may burn up to 650 calories.
Finally,but not least, i really hope that this article has instilled some knowledge within you who has read it. Let's correct our misconceptions about blood donation and starts donating now..you can save up to 3 lives by 1 session of blood donation.
Help yourself by helping others (",)
Lets educate each other and let this world be the nice and safe place to stay.
Have you donate blood before?
