October 2011

Making Cream of Wheat a Pumpkiny Treat

Melissa Ramos is a volunteer and guest-blogger for Stanford Blood Center. Here, she shares a fall-inspired, iron-rich recipe to help boost your hemoglobin level in preparation for donating blood.

During the medical history screening, blood donors must meet a hemoglobin-level requirement of at least 12.5 g/dL. One of the causes of low hemoglobin is a low-iron diet. Cream of Wheat is an excellent source of iron and can be prepared quickly compared to other iron-rich sources like beef, chicken, and other meats. Because Cream of Wheat can be rather bland alone, I wanted to share this great fall-inspired recipe that makes Cream of Wheat tasty!

The following recipe came from one of my favorite sites, however I made a few changes to make it even more suitable for preparation of an upcoming blood donation.

Pumpkin Spice Swirl Maple-Date Cream of Wheat

makes 2 bowls

2 cups of water

1/3 cup Cream of Wheat

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

3 Tbsp maple syrup
1/4 cup chopped dates
1/3 cup canned pumpkin
1-2 tsp vegan buttery spread

soy milk for topping (use sparingly)
garnish: dash of cinnamon, chopped dates

optional: chopped pecans



Directions:



1. Bring your water to a boil. Add the salt and Cream of Wheat. Constantly stir gently. Bring to a strong boil, then reduce heat to medium. Be sure to keep a close eye. Once it starts to boil it will overflow quickly!

2. Continue stirring until the cereal thickens. At this point you can stir in the cinnamon, dates and maple syrup.

3. When cereal has cooked into a thick, hydrated consistency (like thick applesauce) turn the heat to low.

4. Stir in the pumpkin over low heat. You can either stir it in completely or you can leave it swirled gently into the cereal.

5. Turn off heat and spoon cereal into bowls. Add the vegan buttery spread, a dash of cinnamon (I added more to give it an extra “spice” flavor) and a splash of milk on top. Add a few leftover chopped dates as garnish.

A few of my own recommendations:

• Dates are a good source of iron. If they don’t appeal to you, try raisins as a great alternative.

• Use the soymilk sparingly. Calcium can inhibit the body’s ability to absorb iron. Although it’s naturally low in calcium, many manufacturers add it to their product.

• Enjoy with a glass of vitamin C-rich grapefruit juice to help your body absorb the iron.

How do you eat your Cream of Wheat? What other meals do you like to cook in preparation of your donation?

There’s Nothing Scarier Than a Blood Shortage

By Julie Ruel, Social Media Manager, Stanford Blood Center

Each day, the recruitment team at Stanford Blood Center (SBC) works hard to help ensure we have blood products available to those in need. “We do this by connecting with donors and inviting them to return. It sounds simple enough, but the reality is that this mission takes time, strategy, and creativity,” explains Karen Paganelli, recruitment manager at SBC. The hospitals’ needs fluctuate from day to day and we must constantly keep on top of our inventory to make sure the right type is available at the right time for the right patient.

One constant challenge we face is the need for Rh-negative blood types (those that lack the Rhesus D antigen: O-, A-, B-, AB-). Rh-negative (or Rh-) red blood cells are important because of their compatibility with both Rh+ and Rh- blood types (see compatibility chart below for specifics). Only a small percentage of the population (around 15%) is part of this group. However, from week to week, we need approximately 20-22% of our visiting donors to be Rh-. Because these percentages are unbalanced, our pool of eligible donors in this blood group can be quickly depleted.

O-negative red blood cells specifically

We reach out to our O-negative donors often and here’s why. These folks have the universal blood type. In simple terms - their blood can safely be transfused to anyone, regardless of that person’s blood type. Imagine an emergency situation, say, an automobile accident. People need blood and they need it right away. Without time to test their blood type, doctors must reach for the bag of O-negative, the only safe choice in this type of situation.

In addition, because only about 6 out of 100 people are part of this group, it’s that much more difficult to keep a sufficient inventory.

Rh+ blood types

The fact is, all blood types are needed. We couldn’t produce an article about the importance of blood donations without mentioning Rh+ blood types. We + folks are part of a much larger population which makes us very important as well. Think of it this way - the more common your type, the more people there are that need your type!

The need for blood will never go away. There will always be surgeries to perform, emergencies that happen, and people with conditions who rely on blood products for day-to-day survival. It’s critical that we make sure blood is stocked in our hospitals’ refrigerators and ready to go at any given time. They rely on us and we rely on you!

Rarest ABO Type – Bombay Phenotype

By Billie Rubin, Hemoglobin’s Catabolic Cousin, reporting from the labs of Stanford Blood Center

Just in case the excitement of the ABO blood group system was beginning to subside, there is one other very, very rare ABO type first described in India. It is known as the "Bombay phenotype" and on the surface it looks like a type O. It is found in one out of 10,000 people in India, and one in a million in Europe.

The building blocks from which the A & B antigens are made is known as the H antigen. A and B genes transform most H's (not all) into As and/or Bs, respectively. Type O has the largest amount of "untransformed" H antigens.

Most people have HH or Hh genes but Bombay phenotypes don't. They are recessive hh. With no building blocks for A or B antigens, they look like a type O but they can make antibodies to the foreign H antigen - regular type Os don’t. They are incompatible with almost everybody! Only another Bombay phenotype can be transfused to them, usually from rare frozen inventories.

Where There is Hope

By John Williams, Marketing Manager, Stanford Blood Center

HopeLab is a non-profit organization that works to harness the power and appeal of technology to improve kids’ health. In 2005, they launched Re-Mission, a video game for young cancer patients, which has been proven to significantly improve key behavioral and psychological factors associated with successful cancer treatment. To date, more than 180,000 copies have been distributed to 81 countries worldwide. Re-Mission is given out free of charge to young cancer patients, their families, and caregivers.

Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital (LPCH) was an Outcomes Study site for this groundbreaking video game. As we provide blood products to LPCH for pediatric cancer patients, many of whom might benefit from playing Re-Mission, we are pleased to help HopeLab get the word out about this great resource. We feel especially close to the cause as we often see parents of these patients at our Centers donating specifically for their child through our Directed Donations program.

HopeLab is also focused on research which will impact other childhood diseases, such as obesity, sickle cell disease, and autism. We are proud to be associated with an organization that is dedicated to promoting quality of life for young people with chronic illness.

HopeLab will be hosting a photo booth at our Mountain View Center on Monday, October 31 from Noon to 2pm as part of the JOY Campaign in celebration of their tenth anniversary. Blood donors will have the opportunity to put on their best Halloween costumes and make silly faces. Photos will be uploaded to a special website.

For more information about HopeLab, please visit their website.

To learn more about Re-Mission or to order a copy, please click here.

The Safe Blood Africa Project: Background

By Amanda Baker, Communications Intern, Stanford Blood Center

This is part 1 of 3 in our series on the Safe Blood Africa Project

Communities around the globe require a safe and plentiful blood supply, and the need for blood transfusions affects patients worldwide. With this in mind, Stanford Blood Center, along with Sacramento’s BloodSource and Northern California Community Blood Center, is teaming up with the Safe Blood Africa Project to bring safe blood programs to Nigeria.

The Safe Blood Africa Project is an undertaking by the Rotary International World Community Service that aims to improve blood banking in Africa by establishing voluntary blood donation centers in places where blood is not available to patients in need. This involves bolstering blood facilities and training local personnel.

The project began when Warren Kaufman, former president of the Rotary Club of Carmel Valley, discovered the profound need for safe blood in Nigeria on a 2002 Group Study Exchange trip in Africa. Upon his return to the United States, Kaufman contacted representatives from four northern Californian blood centers and reached out to other Rotary Clubs for assistance in improving the blood banking system in Nigeria. Nigerian Rotary Clubs also contribute support coordinated by Edemekong Edemekong, a Superior Court Justice and Rotarian in Nigeria.

Among the first tasks of the project was addressing the lack of adequate blood storage. Collected blood needs to be kept cool to ensure it stays safe and effective for transfusion, but cold environments can be difficult to establish in areas with sweltering temperatures and where electricity can be intermittent. Thus, BloodSource and the Rotary Clubs of Redding and Eureka helped purchase refrigerators and generators to help keep blood cool even in the event of a power outage. Stanford Blood Center along with three other California blood centers (a group formerly known as Blood Innovations) also contributed funding to send blood center employees and Rotary representatives to Africa to deliver the much-needed medical equipment and provide training in laboratory procedures and medical administration.

Other partners in the Safe Blood Africa Project include Global Healing, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting health care reform and modern medical care to the developed world. A $150,000 grant from Global Healing has enabled employees at BloodSource to work alongside the Safe Blood Africa project through 2012, with an emphasis on training physicians, nurses, scientists, and recruiters.

Safe Blood Africa associates recently returned from a visit to Nigeria to deliver medical equipment and to train local health professionals in blood collection. Click here to read about their trip!

The B.E.S.T. Insights

By Julie Ruel, Social Media Manager, Stanford Blood Center

The marketing group at SBC recently had the privilege of working with a group of students at the Stanford Graduate School of Business studying brands and user experiences. The class, called B.E.S.T. (brands, experiences, and social technology), was given the task of observing consumers in a natural setting, evaluating their findings, then offering insights intended to help tighten the gap between what consumers need to make for a positive experience with a company, organization, etc. and what that brand offers.

Because of the constant challenge in meeting the demand for blood products and, as class leader Emily Ma states, “the immense value Stanford Blood Center brings to the medical community”, they chose us as the brand to study. This is an elite group of students, many of whom will advance into roles as business leaders, and we were honored to be the subject of their assignment.

To kick things off, they asked some of our donors (representing the “consumers”) and staff the first five words that come to mind when they think of Stanford Blood Center. Here’s a word cloud highlighting the most commonly shared one-word descriptions:

Please, in the comments section below, share any words that come to mind for you.

For the rest of the assignment, some students became blood donors and others chatted with individuals before, during and after their blood donation. Then, leaving any of their own judgments behind, they used an empathetic approach to evaluating their experiences/findings and reported back with what they gathered to be the highs and lows of the donation process.

As you read through this, think about your own experiences as a blood donor. Can you relate? Here’s what they found:

The high points:

• Making the decision to give blood. Studies show that acts of kindness boost happiness levels!
• The greeting upon arrival and the sticker for first-timers. Wearing your “First Time Donor” sticker can initiate conversations and provide an opportunity to encourage others to give blood.
• Successful screening process. Anticipation of doing a good deed + time invested in driving to the Center = a relieved and happy donor when given the okay after the questionnaire and hemoglobin test.
• Snacks and conversation with fellow donors in canteen afterwards. The highlight for many is the sense of community they feel when talking to other donors. Have you ever spoken with the individual next to you at the table? With our diverse demographic of donors, I bet somebody has an interesting story to share!

There are also points along the way that many would just as soon skip if they could. For example, the medical history questionnaire doesn’t appear on most folks’ “favorite parts of the donation process” list. Here are a couple ideas that may be helpful:

• Before your visit, review the eligibility and deferral information on our website to see if travel history, medications, etc. may prevent you from donating on that day. For more specific questions, give us a call before dropping in. We appreciate all attempts to donate and we also want your time to be worthwhile.

• It may help to understand why we are required to ask each donor each question at each visit. Click here for more information on that.

Finally, as we could have predicted, it’s that needle prick that people report as the least glamorous part of the experience. Certain processes around blood donation change from time to time but this one is here to stay, I’m afraid. For many people, though, the anticipation is the worst part. And by that point, the cookies and P.O.G. are almost within reach. Just a brightly-wrapped-in-co-flex arm’s distance away.

Their findings are valuable to us as an organization that relies on volunteers in the community. We encourage your feedback as well. Please feel free to leave comments below. Creating a comfortable, enjoyable environment for our donors is something we take seriously and we strive to do that to the best of our abilities.

Good Things Come in Pairs

By John Williams, Marketing Manager, Stanford Blood Center

Identical twins Anabel and Isabel Stenzel, close friends and strong advocates of our organization, have shared a life-long battle with cystic fibrosis. The amazing pair, who have both benefited from life-saving double lung transplants at Stanford Hospital, are being featured in the United Nations Association Film Festival (UNAFF) documentary “The Power of Two”, inspired by their 2007 memoir.

“The power of two” could also easily describe the partnership between Stanford Blood Center (SBC) and UNAFF. SBC is constantly seeking collaborations with like-minded organizations in order to remain relevant to our donor base and we are delighted to partner with UNAFF. Collectively, SBC and UNAFF impact local people; SBC by serving local patients and UNAFF through education and activism. This year, the Festival, which was founded in 1998 at Stanford by Jasmina Bojic, film critic and educator, explores the theme of education as a human right. This is a topic which should resonate well with the educated and global-minded Stanford community.

UNAFF was originally conceived to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Every year in October, documentary films, many which have either received or been nominated for Academy Awards, are screened at Stanford University, as well as in Palo Alto, East Palo Alto, and San Francisco. This year’s Festival features films from 70 countries, including ten world premieres and ten US/Western US premieres.

We are currently running a promotion for blood donors with the opportunity to win a pair of tickets to this remarkable film. The screening will be on October 26 at the Li Ka Shing Center at Stanford University.

Shark Antibodies

By Billie Rubin, Hemoglobin’s Catabolic Cousin, reporting from the labs of Stanford Blood Center

It turns out that sharks are not just robust killers of the ocean but that they have robust immune systems, too. Who knew? They rarely fall prey to infections and are exceptionally resilient. According to studies at La Trobe University in Melbourne, their antibodies can attach themselves to human cancer cells and actually stop them from spreading. It may also be possible that their antibodies could be used to fight other conditions such as malaria or rheumatoid arthritis.

So if you ever come into contact with shark blood, perhaps you’ll be protected from certain diseases and conditions or from getting your wound infected. There's always a silver lining.

For more in depth information on this topic, visit La Trobe University’s website.

Donating Blood Gives Life… And Hope

By Lori Shoemaker, dedicated blood donor as a result of mom's encouragement

I looked at the date of my last plasma/platelet donation: March 7, 2011. It was August now I realized and as I blinked at the date, it seemed impossible to remember what life was like just those few short months ago – there seemed to be such a gaping hole in reality and time. Within weeks of that donation in March, my Mom and I, together with the love of her life Alec, would celebrate her 60th birthday in the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit waiting for her operation to repair a heart valve and to replace 2 artificial ones.

In the months before this, Mom had relied on blood transfusions – her 32-year-old artificial valves were not seated properly in her heart anymore and the metal cages were literally beating up her red blood cells, the ‘blender effect’, as the cardiac surgeon described it. And while blood transfusions were keeping her going, the valve replacement surgery we had talked about as an only-if-necessary option a few years ago was now inevitable. There was hope – 30% chance of survival – far better than the 10-15% given to Mom for her first valve replacement surgery at 28 years of age.

My brother, sister, and I, and in fact the whole family, rallied around Mom to get her in better physical and mental health before the surgery. The morning of the surgery arrived and we went with Mom right to the doors of the operating room unit. And we waited. The surgery lasted more than 14 hours and required even more blood. But she did it – she survived the surgery – but even as we celebrated this, every complication imaginable presented itself. More blood, more platelets were needed.

A few days after Mom’s surgery, Stanford Blood Center called me while I was in the ICU waiting room to say that I was a match for one of Stanford’s patients, and could I come in to donate plasma and platelets. Through tears, I explained why I couldn’t right then but I would as soon as I could. As I walked back to Mom’s room and saw another unit of platelets helping her along, a scene flashed behind her, a group of people, blood donors, who had never met her before and who would never know that fighting for her was the most worthy of causes. But these people had donated their time and blood, giving someone, somewhere, another hour, another day, more hope. It hit me at that moment, perhaps for the first time, that the success of the surgeons and the full medical team together with the best cardiac technology, would have been impossible without blood donors.

This notion did not escape Mom and while she supported cardiac care and research, she told us the best thing we could ever do is to become blood donors. When Mom had her first double valve replacement, my sister and I were 12 and 9 years old and too young to donate. But as soon as we were both of age, a healthy sibling rivalry grew between us to see who could donate the most blood - the blood donation center was careful we didn’t cheat and rush ahead of the schedule! Our brother, who was born just a few hours before Mom’s first valve replacement surgery, has joined in, too, valiantly attempting to donate several times but these have not been easy. He keeps trying, though!

Mom’s story doesn’t end the way we desperately wished. After three weeks of stubbornly beating every imaginable complication after surgery, she just finally got tired and died. Mom’s words, that the best thing we could do is to donate blood, are still with us. Our family made a huge withdrawal this year but we are back donating. The sibling rivalry is still there but it is soft and gentle now. And we know we are giving someone, somewhere, another hour, another day, more hope.