Donating Blood
To give blood you must weight over 110 pounds, and have a photo ID showing you are 17 years of age or older (or 16 with parental consent). You won't be allowed to donate if you've been feeling sick in the last 48 hours. Other restrictions, such as recent piercings or tattoos, will stop you from being able to donate. See the Red Cross guidelines http://www.redcrossblood.org/donating-blood/eligibility-requirements for other restrictions.
A quick summary is that you may not give whole blood if you:
- Have had hepatitis after age ten.
- Have severe heart problems.
- Are pregnant or have been pregnant in the last six weeks.
- Visited a one of the foreign countries on a list provided at the testing site within a given time frame that verys between the countries
- Are HIV positive or are classed by the FDA as being in a high risk group, defined as:
- Having ever done illegal IV drugs.
- Having hemophilia or other conditions that require treatment with clotting factors.
- Being a man who had sex with another man after 1977.
- Having had sex for money or drugs after 1977.
- Having had sex with any individual who falls into any of the above four categories within the past 12 months.
- Are donating blood in order to test yourself for HIV.
- Had leukemia, melanoma or myeloma (other cancers are subject to various regulation; superficial or cancers in remission generally do not disqualify a person).
Places to Donate
- Blood drives are held once a quarter and during each summer session at UCA. Donors who have donated on campus are eligible to donate at the next drive, as they are spaced out eight weeks. The upcoming blood drives for 2011 are:
- Red Cross always accepts http://www.redcrossblood.org/ walk in donations at weekly blood drives (currently Monday afternoons in front of Autozone on Oak Street).
