How to prepare for donating blood and what are the requirements for a donor?

Preliminary stage

Every person who plans to donate blood should prepare. You cannot drink alcohol for 48 hours, and smoking is also prohibited. However, if a person drinks alcohol often enough, the level of alanine aminotransferase (ALT) can be constantly elevated. People who abuse alcohol should give it up a week before donating blood.

Due to the risk of increasing the level of this enzyme, on the eve of the examination you should avoid eating lard, mayonnaise, butter, and sour cream. If the ALT level is elevated, then the next time a potential donor can come to donate blood no earlier than in 3 months.

Is donation harmful?

Not everyone decides to donate blood because they do not know whether donation is harmful or not. There are many rumors and different opinions surrounding this topic.

Doctors say that being a donor is not harmful or dangerous:

• Only healthy people who have been examined can donate blood, and donating 450 grams is not a health threat.
• Only disposable instruments are used; they are opened in front of the donor.
• Regular blood donation has a positive effect on health, and a person quickly gets used to the loss and recovery and easily tolerates it. After two weeks, its volume is completely restored.
• All rights of the donor are protected by law.

Basic recommendations

Experienced donors know how to prepare so that their blood donation goes well. Rules are necessary for people who are not yet familiar with this procedure.

When planning to become a donor, you need to reconsider your diet. On the eve of this procedure, avoid fried, fatty, and smoked foods. Avoid butter, eggs and dairy products. Ingesting large amounts of animal proteins can make the blood difficult to separate into its components.

Failure to comply with the diet leads to the fact that fat microparticles are found in large quantities in the blood serum. She looks cloudy. Such blood is not suitable for tests or transfusions. By the way, it is not recommended to eat bananas and nuts.

It is also important to pay attention to your well-being. The rules for donating blood state that you should reschedule the procedure if you feel unwell, feel weak, dizzy or have a headache. You should not go to the transfusion station if you had a sleepless night the night before.

Donor's rights

The donor is entitled to various benefits.

Donation is a free donation. There is usually no charge for donating blood, but there are exceptions. If the donor is officially employed, then he has the right to count on 100% payment for the working time he spent visiting the medical institution.

In addition, he can count on an additional day off, provided for rest and rapid recuperation. You need to take advantage of this day right away. It is paid at the same rate as regular working hours.

A donor arriving at a blood station is provided with free tea and buns, which he can consume both before and after the procedure. Regular donors in a number of regions are provided with benefits for medical care and travel on public transport. Donors usually have no other additional privileges.

Day of the procedure

It has been experimentally established that the body tolerates significant blood loss best in the morning. Therefore, for most people, blood is taken for up to 12 hours. Breakfast on the day of the procedure is mandatory. In the morning you can eat any porridge with water, dry cookies, and drink sweet tea.

It is better to go to the blood transfusion station in advance and find out how they donate blood for donation. The rules are the same for everyone. By the way, don’t forget to take your passport with registration with you.

First, the potential donor is asked to fill out a questionnaire where he provides information about his health and lifestyle. After this, he should be examined by a therapist. He can additionally inform you about how blood donation takes place. Rules, preparation and diet are mandatory for everyone.

About 450 ml of biofluid is taken from each donor. Some of it is sent for tests. The duration of the procedure depends on what exactly the person is undergoing. It takes 15 minutes to collect this amount of whole blood. Plasma donation lasts about 30 minutes, platelets – 1.5 hours.

What documents are required?

Those who apply to the transfusion station for the first time should carefully study the delivery procedure. First, such a person is required to present identification documents - traditionally this is a passport with a registration mark. Then an examination is prescribed.

you can use the link donor questionnaire

The donor is obliged to provide the doctor with the following information:

• What diseases were suffered?
• Is he in contact with people infected with infections?
• Does he live in an area that is considered to be an area of ​​epidemics or the spread of infectious diseases,
• Does he use narcotic or psychotropic substances?
• Does he work in hazardous conditions?
• When and what kind of operations and vaccinations took place.

If no contraindications for donation are found, then the staff of the clinical institution allows you to fill out a questionnaire and requires that the volunteer take a finger prick blood test to determine the hemoglobin level and undergo an examination by a transfusiologist.
In the future, the donor undergoes periodic medical examinations. It includes fluorography, electrocardiogram, urine and blood tests, examination by an infectious disease specialist, therapist, and gynecologist (for women).

Behavior after the procedure

Once the blood draw is completed, the person should rest for a while.
To do this, you just need to sit quietly for 15 minutes and drink sweet tea. If you feel unwell or feel dizzy, you should contact the staff. In order to comply with all the rules for donating blood, you must refrain from physical activity on this day. It is advisable to start smoking no earlier than two days after the procedure. It is advisable not to remove the applied bandage for 3-4 hours. This should prevent bruising. But if it does form, then at the site of its appearance it is recommended to make compresses with heparin ointment. Instead, you can use Troxevasin.

It is also important to eat right: the body must receive all the necessary microelements. After donation, you need to monitor the amount of liquid consumed; you need to drink at least 2 liters of water.

Preparing for donation

The content of additional impurities in the blood, which in fact should not be there, makes the liquid unsuitable for use. Before going to the donation point, the donor must prepare. What you need to donate blood for donation - the essence of preparation comes down to the following:

1. You cannot drink alcohol or smoke. Approximately 2 days before blood sampling, avoid any alcoholic beverages. No smoking for 2 hours before the test. If a person drinks alcohol frequently, then in order to extract high-quality blood from his body, he will have to give up alcohol for at least 1 week.
2. You need to refrain from using medications. 3 days before the scheduled procedure, stop taking aspirin and analgin; any blood thinning drugs are also contraindicated.
3. You need to eat right. The donor should not eat fatty, salty, fried, spicy and smoked foods. Milk, bananas, citrus fruits, butter, eggs and nuts are also excluded from the diet for at least 12 hours. You can have dinner with bread, jam, vegetables and fruits, porridge, pasta, crackers and steamed fish. You can drink mineral water, tea, juice, compote or fruit drink, and the drink should not contain caffeine. For breakfast you can eat buckwheat, rice or rolled oats porridge, dried fruits, sweet tea with crackers. It is not recommended to donate blood on an empty stomach.
4. Good vacation. You should only come to the blood station after a good night's sleep. If on the eve of the chosen day a person worked a daily shift or did not sleep for a long time, then it is better to reschedule the procedure for a more suitable time.

Any physical illness, even temporary, is a reason for refusing to draw blood. It’s worth remembering this when starting to prepare for it.

Temporary contraindications

There is a list of situations in which blood donation should be postponed. Rules, preparation, conditions are explained at each blood transfusion station. But people do not always go for a preliminary consultation.

Any healthy person who is over 18 years old and weighs more than 50 kg can become a donor. But even people who meet these parameters can receive a medical exemption for a certain period from the moment of recovery.

Temporary contraindications include the following.

1. Infectious diseases:

• history of malaria (3 years);
• ARVI, sore throat, influenza (1 month);
• typhoid fever (1 year);
• other diseases (6 months).

2. Danger of infection with blood-borne diseases:

• transfusions of blood and its components, surgical interventions, including abortions (6 months);
• acupuncture treatment, tattooing (1 year);
• being on business trips abroad for more than 2 months (6 months);
• stay more than 3 months in countries where malaria is endemic (3 years);
• contacts with persons with hepatitis A (3 months), B and C (1 year).

3. Tooth extraction (10 days).

4. Acute form of diseases or exacerbation of chronic pathologies (1 month).

5. Exacerbation of allergic diseases (2 months).

6. Vaccinations: the rules for donating blood provide for a medical exemption, the duration of which is determined depending on the type of vaccine.

If you are taking any medications, tell your doctor before donating blood. After using antibiotics, a two-week break is required. If you took analgesics or drugs belonging to the salicylates group, then you need to wait 3 days.

Some more important information

In addition to whole blood and its liquid part, individual formed elements are also collected. There are also special rules regarding their delivery. Only young, physically strong, healthy men with sufficient body weight can donate red blood cells. Although the quantitative composition of red blood cells will be restored within a month, such procedures are allowed to be repeated only twice a year (with an interval of six months).

Only verified donors with many years of experience are allowed to donate platelets. Thrombocytopheresis is performed on one person no more than once a month. It is performed in one of two ways. Intermittent - blood is withdrawn in small portions, after which it is returned to the vein, but without platelets. Continuous - material collection and return of the remaining part occur automatically.

The donor can “share” his white blood cells (to be more precise, granulocytes) with other people. These components cannot be stored for long periods of time, so they are not collected for future use. The collection of such biomaterial is carried out strictly “to order” for a specific patient. This type of donation is possible no more than once every 14 days.

On a note! The decision to combine different types of donation is always made personally, depending on the individual parameters and characteristics of the body.

Absolute contraindications

There is a list of diseases for which a person will never be able to be a donor. These include blood-borne diseases. Among them are:

• infectious (syphilis, AIDS, HIV carriage, tuberculosis, viral hepatitis, leprosy, typhus, brucellosis, tularemia);
• parasitic (leishmaniasis, filariasis, toxoplasmosis, echinococcosis, trypanosomiasis, guinea worm).

People with certain physical illnesses are also not suitable. These include:

• blood diseases;
• malignant neoplasms;
• complete absence of speech and hearing;
• organic lesions of the central nervous system;
• mental patients, people suffering from drug addiction and alcoholism;
• respiratory diseases (asthma, emphysema, obstructive bronchitis, bronchiectasis);
• cardiovascular diseases (stage 2-3 hypertension, atherosclerosis, coronary heart disease, myocarditis, endocarditis, recurrent thrombophlebitis, heart disease);
• diseases of the digestive system, liver, biliary tract (ulcers, achilic gastritis, cirrhosis and other liver diseases, calculous cholecystitis);
• kidney disease (urolithiasis, focal and diffuse kidney damage);
• connective tissue problems;
• radiation sickness;
• endocrine diseases that are accompanied by metabolic disorders;
• chronic purulent-inflammatory and acute diseases of the ENT organs;
• eye diseases (myopia more than 6 D, trachoma, blindness, residual effects of uveitis);
• organ resection operations, tissue and organ transplantation;
• skin diseases (psoriasis, pustular and fungal lesions).

Time intervals

If you have carefully read all the contraindications, you can first determine for yourself whether blood donation is indicated for you. It is better to find out the rules (how to donate blood) after reading the full list of contraindications.

If you meet all the requirements, the therapist may allow you to undergo the procedure. Many come to donate blood again. But doing this too often will not work. The break between these procedures should be more than 60 days. Men are allowed to donate blood up to 5 times a year, women - up to 4 times.

True, these restrictions are established for those cases when whole blood is taken from a person. The break between donating plasma and other components is 30 days. Plasmapheresis can be repeated every 2 weeks. The same break is established for plateletpheresis and leukocytapheresis.

HOW IS BLOOD DONATION DIFFERENT FROM PLASMA DONATION?

When donating plasma, blood, after part of the plasma is separated from it, is immediately poured back into the donor’s body. Plasma can be donated up to 6-12 times a year at intervals of at least 2 weeks, and whole blood - no more than 3-5 times a year at intervals of 3 months.

After five regular blood donations, it is better to take a break for 3-4 months. Plasma is restored within a few days, blood within a month.

The process of removing plasma takes about 40 minutes, taking blood - about 10-15 minutes. However, the total time that the donor will need to spend in a medical facility in the first case will be about two hours, in the second case - about one and a half hours.

"DONARE" - from the Latin "to give". Donation is a selfless gift of one’s own blood in order to help loved ones or complete strangers. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) resolution, the collection of blood only on a voluntary and free basis from donors from low-risk populations is the main guarantee of the safety, quality, availability and affordability of blood for transfusion.

In accordance with the order of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation dated September 14, 2001 No. 364 “On approval of the procedure for medical examination of a blood donor and its components,” admission to donation, determination of its type, as well as the volume of blood or its components taken is carried out by a transfusiologist at a blood transfusion station. Thus, cases in which it is possible to donate blood and (or) its components for a fee are confirmed by medical indications established on the basis of a medical examination of the donor of blood and (or) its components and recorded in the medical documentation of the donor of blood and (or) its components. If the donor cannot be allowed to donate blood and (or) its components for a fee, then the donation is carried out free of charge, and in this case the donor is given monetary compensation for food (5% of the subsistence level of the working-age population established in the constituent entity of the Russian Federation, on territory of which blood and (or) its components were donated). In the Perm region this amount is 620 rubles.

Cases in which it is possible to donate blood and its components for a fee are regulated by Order of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation dated December 17, 2012 No. 1069n “On approval of cases in which it is possible to donate blood and (or) its components for a fee, as well as the amount of such payment.”

The amount of payment for donating blood and (or) its components: a) in cases where the donor of blood and (or) its components has a rare blood phenotype or does not have one of the erythrocyte antigens, for one blood donation in the amount of 450 (+/-10 %) ml - 8% of the subsistence minimum for the working-age population in effect on the date of donation of blood and (or) its components, established in the constituent entity of the Russian Federation in whose territory the blood and (or) its components were donated - in the Perm Territory 1,420 rubles;

b) in the case when a donor of blood and (or) its components can be allowed to donate plasma, platelets, erythrocytes or leukocytes by apheresis:

1) for one donation of plasma in a volume of 600 (+/- 10%) ml - 15% of the subsistence level of the working-age population in effect on the date of donation of blood and (or) its components, established in the subject of the Russian Federation in the territory of which the blood was donated and (or) its components (in the Perm region 1,788 rubles);

2) for one donation of platelets in a volume containing at least 200 X 109 platelet cells - 35% of the subsistence level of the working population in force on the date of donation of blood and (or) its components, established in the subject of the Russian Federation in whose territory the blood was donated and (or) its components (in the Perm region - 3588 rubles)

3) for one donation of erythrocytes in a volume of 400 ml (10%) - 25% of the living wage in effect on the date of donation of blood and (or) its components established in the constituent entity of the Russian Federation;

4) for one donation of leukocytes in a volume containing at least 10 x 109 leukocyte cells, using the apheresis method - 45% of the living wage in effect on the date of donation of blood and (or) its components, established in the constituent entity of the Russian Federation.

Nuances for women

Despite the established gender equality, there are points that cannot be ignored. Therefore, the rules for donating blood for women are slightly different. They can donate blood no more than 4 times a year. But this is not the only limitation. Pregnant women and nursing mothers cannot be donors. It has been established that at least a year must pass from the birth of the baby, and more than 3 months after the end of lactation.

In addition, blood is not taken from women during menstruation. You must wait 5 days after the end of menstruation, only after that you can go to the transfusion station.

How often can you get tested?

How often can I get my blood tested?
This is usually of interest to people suffering from diseases that require constant monitoring of certain indicators; pregnant women; patients in hospital. These categories of people have to donate blood frequently, in some cases even daily. Doctors say that the amount of material taken for analysis from a finger or from a vein is too small to negatively affect the condition of the body. Almost all patients easily tolerate this procedure and do not notice the loss at all.

Donors are people who voluntarily donate blood, which will subsequently be used in clinical practice, for the manufacture of its components and medicines, for educational and research purposes.

Donation involves taking a fairly large volume at a time, and this can affect the health and well-being of the donor. Therefore, the donor must have certain parameters: a healthy person from 18 to 60 years old, weighing at least 50 kg, who has undergone a medical examination.

Voluntary donation of blood for transfusion to other people requires strict control, since we are talking about the health and lives of people, both the donors themselves and the recipients. The rights of participants are protected at the state level and enshrined in law. The basic principles of the Donation Law are as follows:

• ensuring material safety;
• surrender only on a voluntary basis;
• ensuring the health of the donor;
• social support and encouragement.

Donation payment issues

Just a few years ago, people who decided to donate blood could receive monetary compensation. For example, in Moscow you could get about 1000 rubles. instead of free food. They were also paid 650 rubles. for every 100 ml of biomaterial. Payment for blood donation in other regions was lower. But active donors received almost 2 times more.

In 2012, a new law was adopted, the provisions of which are aimed at making blood donation free and voluntary. Donors are now only entitled to free food and a number of social guarantees. But at the federal level, cases may be established in which it is possible to donate blood for a fee.

The main idea of ​​the new law is that people should become donors not because of the monetary compensation they are entitled to, but to save lives. The money that was spent on payment is now spent on propaganda. This should attract a larger number of conscientious citizens who do not think that donating blood is just a way to earn money. Naturally, such people must also follow the rules (payment, by the way, is provided for honorary donors), because they do this not for the sake of a small amount, but for a good purpose - to save someone’s life.