There’s no way around it. Donating blood is one of the things we all know we should be doing, yet rarely ever bother. You might see adverts in newspapers, brush past a pamphlet at the hospital or listen to a cousin harp on about the benefits of giving, all whilst never having really considered what might be at stake.
If you have personal experience of those around you requiring blood donation, such as a mother experiencing a dangerous birth or a friend with cancer, then you understand the sheer necessity of the process. When I saw that ScotBlood was coming to St Andrews last month, I signed up instantly. In truth, donating blood is one of the coolest things you can do. I said this to my friends over dinner in a plea to get them to sign up with me, and they grimaced. “Not while I’m eating”, someone said.
My experience with donating blood was thankfully born out of curiosity, as opposed to necessity. Female blood donors are allowed to make donations every 16 weeks (males every 12) and like clockwork, every four months since I was a baby, my mother would go to our local centre to do so. She’d come back with a bandage and an anecdote, appearing to my 6 year old self as a wounded soldier. When I grew older, I went with her, quite frankly expecting a battlefield. Instead, I was overwhelmed by the warmth and generosity in that room.
People tend to be disturbed by the concept of donating blood, as if it’s one step away from meeting Count Dracula. There’s also the misconception that losing a pint of blood will make you feel faint (I promise, you won’t even notice), and the donation centre will therefore feel operative and clinical, with patients everywhere hooked up to wires.
I understand finding this intimidating, but it couldn’t be further from the truth. My first encounter was made up of warm yellow lights, a radio station blasting Capital FM, and a well stocked snack table . As anyone from the UK knows, the NHS staff are always incredibly hardworking and understanding, but the atmosphere was far different to one of a hospital, which understandably tends to make people uncomfortable.
In that room, with hundreds of voices chatting, joking, consoling and comforting, there was an undeniable sense of hope and community. Not everyone there would’ve chosen to be – it’s not uncommon to see tears or the emotional squeeze of a hand. But the act of donation, the inherent selflessness and possibility that you could genuinely be changing a life, makes it the most thrilling experience you can get for free, all within one hour. I don’t know any blood donor who would disagree.
The technicalities of the process are available at ScotBlood, but it can be good to hear through personal experience. After you make a ScotBlood account (assuming you’re donating in or around St Andrews), an appointment with available dates can be set up in seconds at your nearest donation centre, which can be anything from a church to the beloved Club 601, where I donated last Monday.
Upon arrival, a nurse will register you, hand you the standard donation form and offer you some snacks. I’ve found that this questionnaire form can be a point of worry for some people as they’re scared to be turned away, or perhaps embarrassed by the sexual nature of some of the questions. While some criteria are worth researching before, such as weighing between 50-158 kg or being 17-65 years of age, the staff are of course professional and respectful in handling any queries or doubts. There is also nothing wrong with being turned away – on one occasion, they discovered my veins were too small to donate, and didn’t want to cause any bruising by drawing blood. The nurses then apologised and thanked me so profusely for my time that I left the building feeling as if I’d conquered the world, rather than just sat down and eaten3 KitKats.
The process of drawing blood only takes around 5 minutes. After the initial needle insertion, there’s no discomfort or pain, and a member of staff will remain with you constantly, talking about whatever makes you comfortable. A full blood donation is 470ml, and the average person has about 5000ml. Your body makes about 2 million new red blood cells every second, and so it only takes a couple weeks to build up stores of them again – but again, you will most likely not feel any different after the process. In case you experience any issues after donating, staff will hand you a card at the end with important advice and contact numbers. The chances of you experiencing major side effects are around 1 in 10,000.
At the end of the day, if you donate blood and decide the experience isn’t for you, there’s no expectation or pressure to ever do it again. Similarly, opting out of a pre-booked appointment is as easy as an online cancellation button. However, I found that the gratefulness of the staff there, as well as the devastating stories from other donors about their loved ones who were sick, made not returning an impossibility for me. Statistically, donors who have made 10 donations have helped up to 30 patients, and the gratitude of their families and friends is immeasurable.
Altogether, the entire donation process can be summarised in three words: easy, optional and vital. An hour out of somebody’s day every 4 months can completely transform another person’s life. The NHS need 4,300 blood donations every day to meet the needs of their hospitals, a number that is unfortunately hardly ever met. In particular, it’s so important that more young people donate – as generally fitter individuals, their blood has a wider range of uses. Black, Asian and ethnic minority donors are also in great demand by hospitals, as conditions like sickle cell disease or thalassaemia more commonly occur in those communities. Fewer than 5% of blood donors in 2023 were non-white, despite representing around 14% of the population. As a mixed-race blood donor myself, I cannot stress how important it is to address this imbalance with more information and promotion of blood donation. Due to the disparity between blood needed and blood donated, you can be sure that with every appointment, your blood is helping somebody. In 2023, 325,000 people registered to give blood, but only 91,000 of them took the next step of actually attending an appointment. I encourage everyone to recognise the importance of sharing your health with others – with how easy and accommodating the NHS makes your experience, there is really no reason to avoid due to inconvenience. If you’ve had personal experiences with blood donation before, I thank you for taking the jump . But, if you’ve been lucky enough to have no one in your life need blood, and are considering it out of curiosity, I implore you to donate! You never know who’s life out there you could be saving.
Register at www.scotblood.com and book an appointment today.