New Features At Annual Cherry Festival Blood Drive

TRAVERSE CITY, MI (JUNE 26, 2008): Nine years after a marrow transplant and multiple blood transfusions, Kathy Pedersen of Traverse City plans to tell her story to anyone who wants to listen – provided they’re willing to consider giving blood and/or registering as a prospective marrow donor at Michigan Community Blood Centers blood and marrow donor drive on Monday, July 7, 2008 at the National Cherry Festival in Traverse City.

The drive will run from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. rain or shine, on the Blood Bus at the Open Space on Grandview Parkway. No appointment is necessary. Blood donors of all types are needed and there is also a special need for people with type O blood. Free blood-type testing also will be offered at the drive.

Any healthy person 17 or older who weighs 110 pounds or more may be able to give blood every 56 days. Any healthy person age 18 to 60 may be eligible to join the National Marrow Donor Program’s (NMDP) international registry of prospective marrow donors.

Prospective marrow donors give a blood sample for tissue-type testing. People registering as potential marrow donors are not required to give blood but blood donation is strongly encouraged. “Blood is needed every day,” said Ann Dasin, Blood Center recruiter. “On average one out of every seven people entering the hospital will need blood.”

Pedersen will work as a volunteer at the drive, welcoming blood and marrow donors in the canteen. In 1998, at age 39, she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a type of bone cancer. After a stem cell transplant, she also needed platelet and red-cell transfusions during her recovery, while her body was unable to produce normal levels of blood cells. “After the transfusions, my life energy was literally given back to me,” Pedersen says. “Hope would be restored as I felt my strength returning and consequently the ability to go on – one day at a time – until finally nearly two years later I was functioning at a normal level.”

A marrow transplant may be the best hope for survival for people with certain life-threatening diseases including some kinds of cancer. Each year, more than 30,000 Americans are diagnosed with leukemia, aplastic anemia, or any of 60 other life-threatening diseases that potentially could be cured with marrow transplants. Out of all the people who need transplants, fewer than 1,000 actually will have a family member whose tissue-type matches closely enough to donate marrow. For these people, the best hope is a transplant from an unrelated person, such as one of the donors registered in the NMDP database. Michigan Community Blood Centers recruits prospective donors for the NMDP and also provides supportive services for transplant patients and their families.

For more information on the National Cherry Festival blood and marrow donor drive, call Michigan Community Blood Centers at 231-935-3030 or toll free 1-866-MIBLOOD (press 6)

A nonprofit blood bank, Michigan Community Blood Centers in Northwest Michigan collects blood in Antrim, enzie, Grand Traverse, Kalkaska, Leelanau, Manistee, and Osceola counties to provide 100% of the blood supply for hospitals in those counties, including all Munson Health System facilities, West Shore Medical Center in Manistee, and Spectrum Health-Reed City Campus. Across the state, Michigan Community Blood Centers is the sole provider of blood for hospitals in four major regions with a combined population of more than 1.5 million.

© Michigan Community Blood Centers