Blood-donor pool bigger, younger

BY TAMMIE SMITH
Media General News Service
Published: July 2, 2008

Starting July 1, 16-year-olds in Virginia can donate blood as long as they have permission from a parent or guardian. Before, the minimum age to donate was 17.

“It’s a great way to help out other people, to feel good about helping out my community,” said Godwin High School student Cassie Lyons, 16, who plans to donate today.

Melissa Migliarese, 16, also has an appointment to donate today.

“I thought it would be a way to make a difference,” said Migliarese, a student at Tucker High School in Henrico County. “It a way to give back to the community.”

Surveys suggest that only 38 percent of U.S. adults are eligible to donate. Restrictions — including travel to certain areas of the world, previous exposure to hepatitis, and getting tattoos — exclude many people from giving blood.

Many states are trying to expand the donor pool by allowing younger people to donate. About 20 other states allow 16-year-olds to donate blood.

At Virginia Blood Services, which supplies blood and blood products to hospitals in central Virginia, about seven of every 100 blood donations come from high school students. The agency expects 2,000 additional collections annually as a result of the new age eligibility.

Brian Chandler, Virginia Blood Services spokesman, said Monday that 30 new donors who are 16 had appointments scheduled at the agency’s Innsbrook donation center today, while an additional seven 16-year-olds have appointments at the donation center at 2825 Emerywood Parkway in Henrico County.

“A lot of 16-year-olds will probably just end up coming on their own,” Chandler said.

Teens who donate at Virginia Blood Services locations today will be eligible for prizes, including an iPod nano, a cell phone, gas cards, movie passes and more.

Teens are advised to take the same precautions recommended for any donor, such as making sure to eat something and to drink extra water or other noncaffeinated beverages.

“I don’t think there would be any greater risk to a healthy 16-year-old than a healthy 26-, 56- or other-year-old,” said Dr. Harry L. Gewanter, a pediatrician in the Richmond area. “The key is ensuring that there are no other contraindications — the same as you would do for anyone else.”

Recent research suggests that 16- and 17-year-old donors are more likely to experience dizziness, fainting and injuries from falls after donating blood than other donors, but the risk overall for complications is small. In the study, the overall complication rate was 10.7 percent among 16- and 17-year-olds, 8.3 percent among 18- and 19-year-olds and 2.8 percent in donors ages 20 and older.

Tammie Smith is a staff writer at Media General’s Richmond Times-Dispatch.