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Teenage Blood Donors: Are We Asking Too Little and Taking Too Much?
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Bloch, Evan M. Mast, Alan E. Josephson, Cassandra D. Klein, Harvey G. Eder, Anne F. |
| Copyright Year | 2017 |
| Abstract | Young blood donors contribute substantially to the US blood supply, yet these are the donors at greatest risk of immediate reactions and other adverse health effects related to their blood donations. Sixteen and 17-year-old adolescents constitute only 2.8% of the US population, but they contribute an estimated 10% of the blood supply, with more than 1 million donations per year.1 Mass recruitment and blood collection are scheduled at high schools despite the consistent demonstration that teenage blood donors are at significantly increased risk of phlebotomy-related reactions and injuries after blood donation as compared with adults.2 Approximately one-third of all donor reactions and more than half of all syncope-related injuries occur in adolescents and young adults.2 In addition to the immediate hazards of the donation process, iron deficiency has become well recognized as a complication of frequent blood donation, and high school–age students are particularly vulnerable. How did a strategy of deliberate and disproportionate blood collection from young donors come to be, and should this be abandoned or at least modified? Blood collection is stringently regulated in the United States. Blood centers must conform to federal regulations and most adhere to additional voluntary accreditation standards. Consequently, numerous precautions have been instituted both to protect the donors' health and to ensure the safety of the blood supply. Young age is the strongest independent predictor of adverse reactions, yet, specific eligibility criteria have not been defined in federal regulations or accreditation standards beyond those that apply to all donors, such as weight, blood pressure, heart … Address correspondence to Evan M Bloch, MD, MS, Department of Pathology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 600 N. Wolfe St, Carnegie 446 D1, Baltimore, MD 21287. E-mail: ebloch2{at}jhmi.edu |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| DOI | 10.1542/peds.2016-2955 |
| PubMed reference number | 28258073 |
| Journal | Medline |
| Volume Number | 139 |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://open.library.emory.edu/publications/emory:sdw64/pdf/ |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2016-2955 |
| Journal | Pediatrics |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
