Posted on 07/20/2007 12:34:13 PM PDT by Winged Hussar
The people with the highest concentration of O-type blood live behind Offa'sDyke.
For you to have O-type blood, both your mother and father must have O-type. If one has O and One has A, you will always be an A.
Laughed at happens frequently...
Yeah the AB plasma info was news to me. I’m B tho, so it doesn’t include me. Last time I gave blood I passed out. The worst thing about it was I was at work (high school teacher) so it was really embarrassing!
susie
It’s OK, I don’t like needles either.
Stationed in Berlin in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s they won’t let me donate blood.
Sort of ironic, isn’t it?
Good cause Ping.
If you know anyone who is AB blood type, please encourage them to be a regular plasma donor and save lives.
The rest of us have anti-A and/or anti-B antibodies in our blood plasma, and can’t do this service.
Plasma is the fluid part of blood minus the red blood cells, so you don’t get anemic or weak after donating.
See post 46.
If you needed blood you wouldn’t care that it came from the Red Cross.
Good grief!!
Help out your fellow man, you’ll feel good about yourself.
Re:
Blood and plasma are slightly different, plasma is the liquid component of blood and AB is the universal donor when it comes to plasma.
With blood O- is the universal donor and AB is the universal recipient.
The above is entirely correct. I am used to donating whole (AB) blood, which can help only about 4% of the population, but of course it frees up an O, A, or B unit for someone else. With plasma, it’s the other way around.
how much does blood cost these days? Last time I donated was for a friend’s friend having a surgery...and I gave at the hospital. I always wondered what the charge is for blood needed during surgery.
Re: “I read about a disease fairly common in people of european descent that causes a buildup of iron in the body. Giving blood is the *cure* and I think they recommend they give once per month. Something like that.”
I heard that donating blood is actually healthy, for exactly this reason, and especially for men. The story is that TOO MUCH iron in the blood is a cardiac risk factor. Women lose some blood every month until they are about fifty, but men don’t. In this case, donating blood not only helps someone else, it’s good for the donor too.
Actually not precisely true. If the parent with A gene also has O recessive, then half the children can be O. If parent is AA (with both genes A), then you are correct.
I used to be a blood bank tech before I went to med school.
Well, I don’t like needles, but that wasn’t it. I just had to get up and get back to class (took too long in line, I should have said never mind) and hadn’t had lunch. Stupid on my part, I won’t do that again. But it’s sort of made me put off giving blood since then. I need to do it tho. It’s a good thing...
susie
“I used to donate all the time but the Red Cross doesn’t want my blood any more. I lived in Germany for 6 months in 1987 and that makes my blood a risk for mad cow.”
Same here. I was stationed in Germany for 3 1/2 years and now they won’t take my blood. I don’t have mad cow disease and probably never will. I would gladly donate any day. Stupid red cross.
One of our friends has that condition, I wish I could remember the name offhand. He was told that it is common among people of scotch and irish ancestry. He gives blood every six weeks.
I wouldn’t give **** to the Red Cross. There’s no way to know what their overpaid executives will do with it.
Just because they say it is for the military, doesn’t make it so.
If you want to give, go right to the VA.
And I have no idea if the Red Cross is making money off my donation or if the intended recipient(s) are actually getting my donation.
I want nothing to do with giving anything to the Red Cross.
I’m all in favor of helping to support blood donations, but not at the Red Cross.
Hemachromotosis or something like that. I’d look it up but I’m too lazy... ;)
susie
I tried to give blood for my husband when he was in the hospital. It was refused, because according to the doctors in charge, the hospital was unable to use blood except from the Red Cross. I don’t recall if it was a law or hospital policy.
You should have got an update from RC about that - I know I did - you are “good to go” to donate, if that is the only issue. Call them and ask, to be sure.
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