Supporting Hematology Practices – National Blood Donor Month
Posted Tuesday, January 11, 2022
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Hematology Support
At CuraScript SD, we provide Hematology practices access to the essential therapies needed to provide quality patient care. Blood donations work in conjunction with these therapies to help patients with various hematological diseases, including anemia, sickle cell disease and thalassemia.
National Blood Donor Month
On December 31st, 1969, President Richard Nixon signed a proclamation designating January as National Blood Donor Month. This monthly observance was created to honor voluntary blood donors and encourage more people to give blood. January is typically a period of critical blood shortages due to people getting sick during cold and flu season and a decline of donations during the holidays.
Why Donations Matter
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Blood transfusions are one of the treatments made possible because of donations. Transfusions can be used to support drugs that help patients with a variety of diseases. Those with leukemia, lymphoma or other blood diseases such as hereditary anemias need periodic blood transfusions for several reasons:
- Many chemotherapy drugs can temporarily impair blood cell production and depress immune system functions
- Stem cell transplant patients receive high doses of chemotherapy, which depletes stores of normal blood cells
- The disease process itself can interfere with the usual production of red cells, white cells and platelets
Donating for Research
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Sometimes, donors are not eligible to donate to the community blood supply. In these cases, they are still able to help others by donating blood for research. These donations have helped with many medical studies, including:
- Validating new tests to detect infection viruses
- Developing tumor vaccines
- Developing new procedures to inactivate viruses in the blood.
- Blood donations are also used in research for the development of new therapies. Physicians have looked at using convalescent plasma to treat a variety of conditions. Convalescent plasma is plasma that contains lots of proteins and antibodies. Patients who receive this plasma can benefit from those antibodies, helping to treat their condition.
Learn More
Click here for more information about how CuraScript SD supports hematology practices and their patients.
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References
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https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/blood-donation-completely-altruistic-so-much-benefit-to-so-many-people#Why-blood-donations-matter
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https://www.aabb.org/for-donors-patients/faqs-about-blood-and-blood-donation ![]()
https://www.lls.org/treatment/types-treatment/blood-transfusion ![]()
https://www.bloodworksnw.org/research-old/life-saving-discoveries
https://stanfordbloodcenter.org/research-updates/donating-for-research/
