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Call today! 916-706-0169 HomeCareAssistanceSacramento.com 5363 H Street, Suite A, Sacramento, CA particular blood product, his or her
blood cells are, platelet and plasma
blood bank can request it.
donors can donate more frequently. The technique, called apheresis, involves drawing blood and spinning,
In Sacramento, BloodSource can use special techniques to take only plasma or only platelets from a donor.
or centrifuging, the blood to separate the components by density. The desired fraction is removed, and the rest of the blood is continuously returned to the donor. The No. 1 goal at the Sierra Oaks donor center is safety, both for the donor and the recipients of the donor’s gift. Safety begins by asking potential donors a lot of questions about their health, where they’ve
Most donations are of whole blood. Drawing a “unit” (roughly 2 cups) of blood takes about 10 minutes. Normally, blood clots outside the body, so the sterile collection bag contains an anticoagulant. Whole blood is a complex mixture of red and white blood cells, a protein-rich liquid called plasma, and platelets, tiny cells whose job is to stop bleeding. Each of these components has a particular medical use. Because not every patient needs red cells, plasma and platelets, a single donation can be separated into these parts and distributed to help more than one recipient. Plasma taken from whole blood donations is sent to a special manufacturer to turn it into medicines that treat hemophiliacs and people who don’t make enough antibodies. In Sacramento, BloodSource can use special techniques to take only plasma or only platelets from a donor. Because these blood components are replaced in the body faster than red
traveled and certain behaviors that affect the risk of unknowingly carrying an infectious disease. Donors are then given a quick physical exam: Vital signs are taken, and a finger prick yields a few drops of blood to test for hemoglobin, an ironcontaining protein that gives blood its color. One common reason a willing donor might be turned away is if she doesn’t have enough hemoglobin to spare. A blood donation could put her health at risk. Often, this deficiency can be corrected by increasing the iron in her diet. Donors are carefully screened to minimize the chance of their blood transmitting an infection, but a lot more needs to be done before their blood is ready to give to a patient. Next month, we’ll follow a donation to BloodSource’s laboratories at Mather Field and learn some cool science. Amy Rogers is a novelist, scientist and educator. To invite her to speak at your book club or public event, email Amy@AmyRogers.com n
MOMSERVATIONS FROM page 56 “Flipped it on a freeway off-ramp.” With each confirmation the excitement for getting my son his first car and having him relieve my burden of being the family chauffer got gobbled up by a growing pit of anxiety in my stomach. I started asking my friends who had older children now driving around town if their kids had been in any accidents yet. “Flipped their first car. Thank god everyone was OK.” “Clipped a car when traffic came to a stop at Watt and Fair Oaks.” “Crashed into a light post in the Bela Bru parking lot.” “They got rear-ended.” “Said they don’t know what happened and how that long scratch down the driver’s side got there.” The results were in. The first car is indeed the Crash Car. With Logan’s 16th birthday this month and him ready to trade in his learner’s permit for a driver’s license, two things had become evident: It was time to downgrade what we were willing to spend on a car, and upgrade our insurance. It was already bad enough that for the foreseeable future I wouldn’t be able to sleep until I heard my son’s car pull into the driveway at night; that I would always worry about the temptation to text and drive; that his freedom to drive would also come with the perils of bad drivers, distractions, and bad ideas that seemed like a good idea at the time. And now I had to live with the knowledge that come Logan’s 16th birthday and his license to drive it is
not if, but when, he will crash his first car. All the fun has been sucked out of the excitement of buying my son his first car because it will be a Crash Car. I guess we’ll get him a minivan. Nobody cares if those things get banged up. Kelli Wheeler is a Sacramento mother of two and author of “Momservations—The Fine Print of Parenting.” She can be reached at Momservations.com n
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