As the Labour Day long weekend approaches, Canadian Blood Services (CBS) is putting out a plea for blood donors.
CBS needs 25,000 units of blood from across Canada before Labour Day. Nearly 1,400 of those appointments need to be filled in Edmonton alone. Calgary has 1,184 appointments available before the long weekend.
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CBS said blood donations often slow down over the summer months, because of holidays and changes in routine. Somewhere in Canada, a patient needs a blood transfusion every 60 seconds.
“The Labour Day long weekend is particularly challenging as families spend time wrapping up the summer before transitioning into the back-to-school period,” said Mark Donnison, vice president of donor relations.
“Earlier this summer, we asked Canadians to take some precious time out of their summers for patients in need of blood. And they responded. To continue to meet patients’ needs, we urge new and returning donors to book an appointment starting now and through Labour Day.”
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New guidelines introduced late last year, which limit the number of times female donors can donate in a year, left the organization scrambling to find donors earlier this year.
The new rules mean that female donors are now required to wait 12 weeks or 84 days between donations, as opposed to the previous eight weeks or 56 days.
“The real core outcome of this is you see that very frequent donors do have a higher tendency to having lower iron stores in their bodies and it can lead to things like anemia. We’ve put these changes in place to help prevent that kind of occurrence,” Donnison said earlier this year.
Donnison said women traditionally have lower hemoglobin levels than men in part due to menstrual cycles.
“We’ll often see that a female coming in is eligible one time and two or three donations later the iron level will be a little bit lower and they get deferred,” he said.
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As of March 5, donors also have to pass a slightly higher hemoglobin test.
The changes will lead to roughly 35,000 fewer blood donations per year, Donnison said.
To book an appointment, locate a clinic or check your eligibility, download the GiveBlood app or visit Canadian Blood Services’ website.
Here’s a closer look at the number of appointments available before the long weekend in cities across Alberta:
- Canmore: 65
- Edmonton: 1,359
- Leduc: 29
- Lethbridge: 320
- Red Deer: 432
- Spruce Grove: 22
- St. Albert: 29
- Stettler: 75
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