Blood is life and for this reason, Dr. A S Akanmu, an Associate Professor of Hematology and Blood Transfusion, and HOD, Hematology and Blood Transfusion College of Medicine of the University of Lagos, discuses the importance of blood donation with Ayo Ajayi. Excerpt:

AYO: Why is it important to donate blood?
AKANMU: Why it is important is that, unlike other drugs, very unfortunately, the blood is not something you can manufacture. Till today nobody has succeeded in manufacturing something that is similar to blood, which can serve the same function the blood serves in the human body. Without the blood you can not live. Infact, once somebody is bleeding, you are loosing life. And there is no other way of actually getting something to replace what the person is loosing other than that, you get similar blood, which is compatible with that of other people and that of the person that is loosing blood to replace the life for him or her.
So, the accident, particularly road traffic accident and any other forms of accident that can result in injury to human body that can cause hemorrhage is the most important emergency that any hospital can face and of course if the blood bank is not prepare to meet such emergency, we will be loosing a lot of life.
Apart from road traffic accident, we have a number of other disease entities for which if the blood is not promptly made available, we are going to be loosing life. For example, a young lady had just put to bed but the uterus will not contrast, she keep loosing blood after birth, what we call severe post birth hemorrhage, if there is no blood ready to be use, such person after birth will bleed to death. And there are a number of other emergency situations that if the blood is not pre-existing in the bank; you are going to be loosing a lot of life. So it is important that we should encourage people to think of saving lives of other people.

AYO: So, who is a voluntary donor and how can one qualify to be one?
AKANMU: You see a donor is any healthy adult above the age of 18 years, below the age of 65 years, male or female. What is healthy? You see before we consider you as healthy for the purpose of donation, number one, we must find you fit. Fit in the sense that you have enough blood for yourself and have excess from which we can take. That is one thing that we must ensure. So, somebody who is short of blood or who have enough but not have excess from which we can take can not qualify as a donor. And there are ways we do such testing in the blood bank so that if you pass that test, it means you have enough and you have an excess from which we can take. Otherwise, you will not be considered as a donor.
Number two is that having found you fit that donation will not be injurious to you. We must also try to find you fit that donation you are giving to us will not be injurious to whoever is going to receive it. So for somebody who we know as presently taking drugs, alcohol, aspirin, somebody who regularly visits hotels and pick free girls, these are people who have some behavioral tendencies that may make their blood not very useful when it is tested. So, the donor is a healthy adult above the age of 18 years, below the age of 65 years, male of female. Usually if she is a female, and she is pregnant we will not take her blood and if she is menstruating we will not take her blood.

AYO: Having said this, what measure of blood can be said to be enough and excess before one can donate blood?
AKANMU: You see there is a lot of excess that the almighty God has given to individual, so that, if for any reason, you suffer from hemorrhage, the life is not easily compromised. It’s a protective mechanism that the excess is already there, for example, an average adult requires or consumes approximately 250mils of oxygen every minute. But the blood of an adult is such that every minute it can deliver 1000mils of oxygen to tissues. So the body is equipped with more than four times it oxygen carrying capacity requirement. Now, an average adult has five liters of blood. So 5 liters of blood that the individual has carries nearly 1,000mils of oxygen every minute. Whereas the individual actually needed only 250mils of oxygen every minute. This means you have excess blood already existing in you for you to be able to survive. So when we say you are donating, what we take from you is approximately 1/10 of what you have. Because when we say we take blood from you, it is just less than 1/10 so, if somebody has five liters and we are taking half a liter, what we take is actually less than half a liter.

AYO: Then is blood donation popular in Nigeria, do we have people who just walk into the blood bank, for instance at LUTH here to donate blood?
AKANMU: We have a big problem when it comes to voluntary donation of blood. People are scared to voluntarily come forward to donate blood. They are afraid that when they donate blood, they won’t have enough for themselves and when will the blood be recovered? So the fear is always there, and that is why I actually agree to give this interview that if you people can talk to the larger society, they will know that donation exercise is very safe. So the people that come usually to donate blood are the people we call Family Replacement Donors. You see, people don’t come voluntarily to say I just want to save the lives of the people I don’t know. It is people whose relatives are sick and they require blood. These are the category of people we call family replacement donors. But you see we try on our own to encourage family replacement donor to turn to voluntary blood donor.
The problem we have actually is that people, who come as members of family to replace the blood that you are giving, are not true member of the family. These are actually touts. Somebody who will put himself down, because of money to donate blood, is an individual who could do anything for money. And these are the people we try to discourage from donating blood. Because these are the people who are likely to indulge themselves in a lot of risky behaviour that will eventually make that blood not useful.

AYO: Aside having the feeling of contributing to save humanity, what other benefit does a donor have particularly for their health?
AKANMU: Yes, the incentives are number one, for a people who actually donate blood there are some benefit to their individual health. For people who are regular blood donor, they rarely develop white marrow. Their bone marrow is usually young such that with the age their marrow does not age. When they become elderly they are not going to be suffering from anemia of age. Anemia of age is usually uncommon among those people who are regular blood donor. Indirectly, some how, regular donation of blood improve the health of your bone marrow and indirectly gives longer survival so to say because you have a healthy tissue that is able to produce blood continuously. So it is an indirect advantage to their health status. So what you consider as harmful is indirectly helpful to you.

AYO: Is there any special diet for one to take to become a healthy donor?
AKANMU: There is no special for you to become a voluntary donor. Just live a normal life and eat balance diet. But each time you donate, you may need some supplements, iron supplement so that the rate at which what you have just giving out will be replenished is quicker. Usually when you give a pint of blood, within a period of three to four weeks, that pint of blood is completely replenished for you if you eat normal diet.

AYO: For a voluntary donor between age 18 and 65 years, how many times can he or she donate blood between this age ranges in his or her life time?
AKANMU: The International Society of Blood Bankers have actually agree that if at least five percent of a given population happen to be voluntary blood donors, we will require that a regular voluntary donor should donate two times in a year, that is every six months. If we have that, we will never run short of blood in almost all blood banks settings. So two times every year is okay.

AYO: Having said all these, in summery, what message do you have for the people as it concern blood donation?
AKANMU: The message I have is that I want healthy Nigerians to know that donation is very safe. Rather than thinking that donation of blood is injurious to you health, it indirectly helps. It indirectly prolongs your life. And when you donate blood always remember that life of somebody that you don’t know has been saved by that act and only God almighty can effectively reward you. Whatever we have as an incentive and a token is just an appreciation. The real reward is that you have contributed your own little quota in ensuring that somebody somewhere regains his life that must have been lost. Again the donation is safe. Whenever you come forward to give blood, if you are not fit to donate, we will always tell you. And of course, intention to donate may be your opportunity to find out that something is wrong and you may begin to find medical solution to some of your problems. It is safe to donate. And it is rewarding spiritually to donate. It also indirectly improves your health and prolongs your life if you donate voluntarily. It is very safe. So let people come forward to voluntarily donate blood.

AYO: Thank you very much sir
AKANMU: You are welcome