Heartlines Fall Winter 2010

R

South Texas Blood & Tissue Center

Serving the community for over 35 years.

Fall/Winter 2010

Improving the Health of South Texans Facts We Can’t Ignore The statistics are startling, even grim.

However, facts once faced become challenges to overcome.

Cholesterol

• In 2007, 38.5% of Texans and 38.4% of people in San Antonio had high blood cholesterol.

• People with high total cholesterol have approximately twice the risk of heart disease as people with optimal levels.

Diabetes

• In Texas, about 1.8 million adults have diagnosed diabetes, and an estimated 460,040 have undiagnosed diabetes.

• Diabetes was the sixth leading cause of death in Texas in 2002 through 2006.

Prostate Cancer

• Next to skin cancer, prostate cancer is the most common cancer in American men.

• About one man in six will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during his lifetime.

Statistics from: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Texas Diabetes Council, American Heart Association, Amercian Cancer Society

On behalf of local patients, the South Texas Blood & Tissue Center (STBTC) thanks you for your generous donations. Because of you, many of our community members are alive and doing well.

As a health care organization, we want to contribute even more to the overall health of the community. In an effort to promote wellness in patients and donors, beginning in 2011, donors will receive points to redeem for select health screening exams at no cost.

Points earned: 1 point for whole blood or plasma donation 2 points for platelet or dual red cell donation STBTC hopes to inspire wellness throughout the South Texas community by helping donors and their families detect or monitor health concerns that can lead to heart disease, stroke, cancer and other serious illness.

The best part about this program is that donors can “spread the health” so to speak, and pass their points onto family members or friends so that they can receive a free health screening.

Follow these easy steps to monitor your health: 1. Donate regularly and earn points.

2. Call South Texas Blood & Tissue Center (210-731-5555) to check how many points you’ve earned.

3. When you have enough points, call STBTC to redeem them. Make an appointment to have a small vial of blood drawn at the site that’s most convenient to you in San Antonio, New Braunfels or Victoria.

Rural area appointments will be made in conjunction with health fairs. Visit our website for specific information.

4. The results will be mailed to your address in about 7-10 business days.

Continued on page 3

Committed to Community by

Kevin J. Land, MD President/CEO and Medical Director South Texas Blood & Tissue Center

Whether we like to admit it or not, blood banking is a business. We have to operate efficiently and wisely. But we must never forget that our mission is to the patients who need us. Patients deserve the best possible health care at the best possible cost.

public. In effect, we are like the utility companies that give you helpful hints on how to reduce unnecessary usage.

For many years we have offered a mini-physical for each donor, but in 2011 we will take donor health to another level. For the first time in our history, we are launching a Wellness Rewards Program. Donors earn points for each donation and then redeem them for select health screening tests. We hope to inspire a culture of wellness among our donors that will benefit both them and their families. This program is the cover story in this issue of Heartlines.

South Texas Blood & Tissue Center continually looks for ways to improve service and reduce expenses. Recently we joined in a mutual effort with three other independent blood centers in Austin, Corpus Christi and Dallas. The Alliance for Community Transfusion Services (ACTS) is a collaborative effort among these community blood centers to share information, reduce costs and provide local hospitals with efficient customer service.

As cost savings drive health care decisions for our clients, we will continue to find areas where we can be more resourceful. Our employees actively participate by proposing suggestions on all aspects of the Center.

We have already initiated several ideas in the last six months.

“As cost savings drive health care decisions for our clients, we will continue to find areas where we can be more resourceful.”

The mission of STBTC comes from the heart of its people. Our employees take the lead in participation in healthrelated civic events. They join with other community and civic organizations to improve the lives of our South Texas neighbors. Collectively, we are a team passionate about patients and our community.

A few weeks ago I heard Henry Cisneros, Executive Chairman of City View, comment on San Antonio’s performance through the nation’s economic downturn. Based on a report from the Brookings Institution, San Antonio was the top performing metropolitan economy in the US, ranked 32nd in the world of all metropolitan areas. While the economic issues we are facing will likely continue for awhile longer, I am confident that South Texas Blood & Tissue Center has the people and the talent to continue to be a leader in our community and beyond.

The past few months we have worked hard to get out the message about type specific donations. That’s best illustrated by the story of Goldilocks: not too much, not too little, but just right: the right amount, the right blood type, at the right time to best meet patient needs. To accomplish this, we have a high-performance, cross-departmental team that meets weekly to review the current inventory and make decisions regarding a wide range of recruiting, collections and distribution issues to ensure we have enough blood on our shelves. I am incredibly impressed at how this team has tackled this project and how much progress they have made in such a short time.

STBTC’s Board of Directors

Dennis Stahl (Chair) Michael Beldon (Vice Chair) John Feik (Secretary) Darryl Waldron, PhD (Treasurer) Susan Ehrman Yasan Gooding, PhD Robert (Wayne) Hilliard, PhD

Other initiatives seem counter intuitive to our mission. For example, our highly-trained personnel work with hospital blood bank supervisors to reduce the amount of blood that is ordered. You might think we’d want to distribute as much blood as possible. But effectively managed transfusion medicine can help lower the overall health care costs to the

2

Norman D. Kalmin, MD Kevin J. Land MD Charles Lerner, MD Blanca Molina, MD Margaret Peters, MD Bill Rasco, FACHE Karen Stiefel, PhD, FACHE

Continued from page 1

Donors begin earning points on January 1, 2011. The first screening appointments will be scheduled on April 1st. Call Sylvia de la Cruz (800-292-5534 or 731-5555) extension 1375 to make an appointment.

STBTC has partnered with other community health care organizations to provide information and resources to encourage positive steps toward health awareness and action. Together, we can improve the health of South Texans.

Current screening tests and points needed

Cholesterol Screening: Lipid Profile Two Points

Diabetes Screening: Hemoglobin A1C Two Points

Prostate Cancer Screening: PSA Four Points

This test includes a check of the total cholesterol, high density lipoprotein (HDL or good cholesterol), low density lipoprotein (LDL or bad cholesterol) and triglyceride levels.

The test measures your average blood glucose control over the past two or three months. The hemoglobin A1C test does not replace daily self-testing of blood glucose.

The prostate-specific antigen blood test (PSA test) is a screening test that measures the amount of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) in a man’s blood.

Diabetes is a serious disease that often goes undiagnosed and can lead to heart disease, kidney disease, amputations and blindness. The Texas Diabetes Council estimates 425,157 persons aged 18 and older in Texas have undiagnosed diabetes.

PSA is a chemical made by the prostate, a gland located near a man’s bladder that produces the fluid in semen. PSA levels normally increase as a man ages, but a higherthan-normal PSA level can be one clue that cancer has developed.

Having high cholesterol increases your risk of developing heart disease, so testing your blood for cholesterol can be a matter of life and death.

It Takes a Special Type to Save a Life

To view a slide presentation on maximizing your donation, visit our website: southtexasblood.org.

Meeting the needs of patients in our community is the goal of STBTC. To accomplish this, the Center works to collect the most effective blood component, based on donor blood type and current patient need. The need for red blood cells, platelets and plasma is monitored daily, which helps us determine the preferred products to collect on a given day.

By making an appointment to donate, you can be sure that your generous donation is the one most needed by hospital patients. Please call 210.731.5555 or 800-292-5534, extension 3500 to make your appointment before your next visit.

STBTC seeks to manage its entire inventory by collecting the right amount, in the right type at the right time. This will maximize each donation and help keep down health care costs.

If you donate at one of our donor sites, you may be asked to change the way you usually donate. Because the Center so closely monitors blood usage, staff is aware of which blood components are most needed by patients.

South Texas Blood & Tissue Center staff appreciates every blood donor who comes through our doors. Thank you for helping us be good stewards of this precious community resource.

3

Delivering Life

The Hospital Services Department (HS) works with over 100 clinics and hospitals in South Texas. Each day HS staff receive between 70 to 120 orders for blood components.

Some orders are basically routine — a standing order that a hospital uses to keep its shelves stocked. Other orders are ‘stat’ with a required fill time of one hour, or ASAP which requires a fill time of 2 hours. Sometimes the request is more unusual, such as, a blood component that contains rare antigens. If we don’t have it available we rely on other area blood centers to help us out.

Every unit must be scanned into the computer system to be placed in the available inventory for storage. The supply is monitored and sorted several times a day to ensure that the most appropriate units are available.

Hospital Services staff keeps careful track of the available blood supply.

Hospital Services operates 13 vans and drives approximately 12,000 miles a week. For example, a van rendezvous with Victoria two to five times a day to pick up blood. Some hospitals and dialysis centers request regular pick-ups of samples which are brought back and tested in our reference laboratory. Our drivers do daily pickups from blood drives and all of our fixed sites to deliver the whole blood to the Component Lab. Hospital Services staff work in three shifts covering community needs 24/7. In spite of being a very busy place, they meet their goal for providing excellent customer service.

Components are delivered to 100 hospitals and clinics in a 43 county area.

Notes & News

Commissioner’s Court

Educational Tours

Commissioners Chico Rodriguez and Tommy Adkisson, County Judge Nelson Wolff, CEO Kevin Land, MD, Commissioner Paul Elizondo, Executive VP Mary Beth Fisk at the “National Donor Sabbath” recognition.

Training Coordinator Sharon Beales guides a group of high school students through the testing laboratories.

National Donor Sabbath is part of an initiative established to educate faith communities about the urgent need for tissue, organ and cornea donations.

4

STBTC’s Education Department routinely conducts tours for various community groups. In 2010, a total of 98 tours with 1,300 participants viewed our facilities.

Remembering Why we Donate “Sickle cell disease affects the whole family.”

Mattie York, single mother of four, knows the impact of this predominantly African-American disease.

Her daughter Breanna was diagnosed through a routine test now given to African-American newborns.

Mattie knew she herself carried the sickle cell trait and first thought the medical staff simply meant that Breanna also carried it. She was shocked to be informed that Breanna had the actual disease. “I really didn’t know what sickle cell was,” Mattie admitted. Breanna was already having pain attacks – quite common for sickle cell patients – but Mattie assumed the baby was just fussy.

Breanna stands between her sisters Erica and Mattronique.

The sisters donate blood regularly.

Mattie explains, “People don’t understand the disease. A sickle cell patient can be fine one minute and exhausted the next. They are much more susceptible to infections.” Both older daughter Erica and Breanna got H1N1 influenza last fall. Erica felt miserable, but Breanna was hospitalized for two weeks.

Breanna was an honor student at Woods Middle School, in spite of being frequently absent due to her illness. Now enrolled in Madison High School, she is looking forward to her schooling there.

The family is glad to participate in South Texas Blood & Tissue Center’s Life Link program. By being Life Links, they can help explain to others what sickle cell is and explain the importance of blood donation.

Erica, a college student and sister Mattronique both donate blood at the South Texas Blood & Tissue Center. They encourage their friends to join them. Erica states, “Not enough African-Americans donate blood. We don’t realize the importance this has in the lives of many people. We need to do more.”

“Many sickle cell patients depend on blood transfusion more than Breanna does. Donating can help so many people,” Mattie says.

Stem Cell Donation

Helping the Community

Miguel Tarango, PBSC Donor

Light the Night Participants

Miguel Tarango was the last peripheral blood stem cell donor for 2010. During the year, 46 people came to our PBSC donor room and gladly donated so that others could have a second chance at life. Donations made at other sites brought the total to 67.

5

Employees lead out in civic events. Recently they participated in charity walks for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and Vital Alliance. They also collected clothing for the Haven for Hope homeless shelter, and pledged to donate nearly $80,000 to the United Way in 2011.

Blood and Tissue Center Foundation Seventh Annual Red and White Ball

When guests arrived for the 7th Annual Red and White Ball at the Marriott Rivercenter on Saturday, October 9, they were awed by the elegant décor and gourmet dining, the musical favorites from the Rick Cavender Band and the stimulating program. And because they came to support The Blood and Tissue Center Foundation, they delighted in the irresistible raffle packages that enabled them to further benefit the Foundation and the Texas Cord Blood Bank.

Chairs Beverly Purcell-Guerra and Dr. Fernando Guerra and Kim and Dr. Michael Fischer assembled a cadre of volunteers who used their talents and energies to create a memorable event for guests and the cause.

Red and White Ball Chairs Dr. Michael and Kim Fischer with Beverly Purcell-Guerra and Dr. Fernando Guerra

Thanks to all these committee chairs and their volunteers: Underwriting – Vernon Torgerson, Mike Kreager and Karen Norman; Table Sales – DeeAnn and Skinner Simpson, Earlyne and Jiggs Buchanan; Decorations – Lori and Mark Wright, Karen Heintz; Raffle – Gretchen and Dr. George Burkholder; Invitation/Program – Mertie and Dr. Dale Wood, Veronica and Dr. John Boldt; Menu – Diana and Daniel Dupré, Gloria and Fully Clingman; Registration – Karen and Joe Dawson, Mary Ann and Charles Franzke; and Publicity – Rose Marie Banack.

Chairman’s Circle Award

The Chairman’s Circle Award was created in 2008 to recognize individuals that have made outstanding contributions to The Blood & Tissue Center Foundation by enhancing, promoting, and supporting the activities and programs of the South Texas Blood & Tissue Center.

The recipients of the 2010 award were Louise and Mike Beldon. They were presented with the 2010 award at the Red and White Ball for their commitment and dedication to the Texas Cord Blood Bank

The Blood and Tissue Center Foundation Chairs Vernon and Nancy Torgerson

Louise Beldon commented, “Many people have been involved in the Texas Cord Blood Bank and we are especially honored to have been a part of such an important project and to be selected for this meaningful award.”

The Beldon’s work with The Blood and Tissue Center Foundation includes service as former Co-Chairs of the Foundation Board. Mike currently serves on the STBTC Board of Directors as well. They believe the untapped potential of cord blood holds promise for countless patients now and into the future and their confidence in the work of the STBTC stems from a personal connection. Three of their children have benefited from blood transfusions and they feel grateful to have this resource in our community.

2010 Chairman’s Circle Award recipients Mike and Louise Beldon

6

Special Thanks to Our Media Partners (September - December)

KISS Rock & Roll Up Your Sleeve Blood Drive September 2 Blood donations: 468

Daniel Lira knows that his donation could help save three lives.

Hill Country Community Blood Drives Blood Donations, September 21: 186 Blood Donations, November 16: 124 Blood Donations, December 28: 131

Donation Celebration Blood Drive November 6 Blood donations: 140 Mother/daughter Kimberly Parras and Betty Arredondo made their first blood donation a time of family togetherness.

Laredo Bucks Blood Drive November 20 Blood donations: 115

Townsquare Media Blood Drive December 27-31 Blood donations: 202

Share the Magic Blood Drives December 3 & December 26-31 Blood donations: 1,507

Monica Federico is happy to be a blood donor.

7

Non-Profit Organization U.S. Postage PAID San Antonio, TX Permit No. 1420

6211 IH 10 W. San Antonio, TX 78201

Serving the community for over 35 years.

Donor Rooms San Antonio:

Pavilion: 6211 IH 10 West Northeast: 8527 Village Drive, Ste. 106 Shavano: 4079 N. Loop 1604 W., Ste. 102 Southeast: 3158 SE Military Dr., Ste. 104 Westover Hills: 10555 Culebra, Ste. 107 Victoria: 1109 Sam Houston Dr New Braunfels: 651 N IH 35, Ste. 830 Visit our Web site for current hours of operation: www.southtexasblood.org

You could win a truck like this!

All presenting donors in 2011 are entered into a drawing to win a 2012 Toyota Tundra Truck.

Every donation increases your chance to win.

R

southtexasblood.org

givetexaslife.org

qualtexlabs.org

marrow.org

bloodntissue.org/texascordbloodbank