INBC blood supplies running low
A recent blitz of flu cases has been responsible for a local shortage of blood at the nonprofit Inland Northwest Blood Center (INBC), which serves Coeur d'Alene area blood needs.
"We are still at a shortage, but it is no longer currently at urgent or critical levels," said INBC territory manager Sandra King. "We do have an ongoing need for donors, particularly any donors with an RH negative blood type. We do want to emphasize, however, that we're hoping to get donors of all blood types."
In order to give blood, a donor must feel healthy, so if someone is in the throes of the flu, they will not make a good candidate for donating blood.
"Because of the flu, we've had a number of regular donors who are not currently eligible and this has caused wide swings in forecasting the accuracy of our blood drive results," King said. "We've had a lot of drives that have been hit hard by no-shows or people who show up and then have to go home sick."
At the same time, she said, the community response to INBC's appeal for help has been impressive.
"The reason we're not currently at the critical level is because of the great community response we've gotten. We have many drives in the past few weeks at which we have seen a larger-than-usual number of first-time donors."
Because it's so perishable, it's impossible to collect blood during the good months and "save" it for the hard times. According to INBC marketing and communications officer, Elizabeth Giles, "Whole blood has a limited shelf life of 42 days, while platelets are only good for five days - it's frequently the cancer patients who are in need of platelets."
Because of the recent blood crisis, several earlier-scheduled, non-emergency surgeries had to be canceled, King said. Also, in the past few weeks, INBC has had to purchase blood from other blood centers because its unmet needs were so great.
INBC serves 35 hospitals from Moses Lake east through Idaho to the Montana border and as far south as Grangeville.
Information: www.inbcsaves.org.