to donate blood if you hobby about once a month and use condoms.  

How much would you really putting someone at risk?

And if the questionnaire probes on these questions, you honestly answer, and as a result you are ruled out, accept it.  I wouldn't second guess folks that have spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to protect our blood supply.

Unless you have an unusually rare blood type, there is more than enough blood out there.  Nowadays people have the option to donate their own blood prior to elective surgery if there is a possibility it might be needed.  A lot of other people who do not participate in risky behavior need as risk free a source of blood as possible.

Screening is not perfect.  There was a time when it was thought HIV could not be transmitted through Blood products (wrong!!!)People at there like you make me hesitate to order blood products for my patients.  You aren't really helping the patients or the medical community when we know there are people out there like you donating blood.  It makes me wait maybe a little longer than I should.  Is that what you really want?

Really the only person you would be helping is yourself by the feelgood feeling you get.  Don't worry, there is no real lack of blood products.  Figure out something else to do to help society.

You know you can also donate blood for research which will not be infused into another human but that is a little messy.

but i wouldn't worry about it  

all donated blood is thoroughly screened before being stored in a blood bank (any medicos care to verifiy this?)

well, let's put it this way, if it WASN'T i'm never getting a transfusion ever again!

LOL

It's not possible to screen for everything.  Example:  prions associated with mad cow disease are not "screenable".  The list goes on, which is why the process of collecting blood is a combination of laboratory testing and honest answers from the donors.  

It's absolutely critical that we have a safe blood supply.  If the questions rule you out, support humanity in a different way.

-- Modified on 7/19/2003 12:55:07 PM

Some diseases are screened by whether you have developed an antibody to them.  If you haven't had time to develop the antibody although you have the disease the test will be a false negative.

The blood banks have recommendations for a reason and I say again, the blood supply is normally adequate enough not to have people at question donating.

The criteria for transfusing people has changed dramatically in the past few years because of the risk of disease transmission.  
Your statement should read that all donated blood is screened to the best ability of the person doing the screening and the equipment they have to screen the blood with.
NOTHING in medicine is perfect or absolute except death and even then, we drag a few people back who were considered dead at some point.
As you know Singleton, I have other things on my mind but this is one thing I wouldn't screw around with.

I'd like to add my 2 cents since I was at one time the recipient of donated blood for a blood transfustion that saved my life.

I would say yes, definatley donate blood. But when you go in, be upfront and honest about your sexual history and the fact that you do always wear a condom. They will appriciate your honesty, and will also appriciate your concern for anyone that would be the recipiant of your donation! If you ask questions, they will be happy to discuss with you what they screen for and any possible risks. And don't worry, they won't judge you just because you are sexually active...if they didn't want blood from people that are sexually active, they wouldn't have too damn much blood would they? LOL

My blood transfusion was done over 15 years ago...a year or 2 before they started screening blood for HIV/AIDS. Even since then, I have always told my doctor about the blood transfusion and have requested an HIV/AIDS blood test every year just to be on the safe side. They have always been negative, and obviously since it was over 15 years ago, if I had been unfotunate enough to get tained blood, I would have dropped dead long ago.

Regardless, I was, and still am, grateful to have gotten the blood that helped save my life. I'll never know who the person that donated the blood was, but even if I was told that it was from man that was very sexually active and used condoms, I would have absolutally no problem with that whatsoever...infact, I'd probably think they matched me up pretty good! LOL

As a side note-If anyone would like to see a few of the x-rays that are of the "repair" work that was done on me all those years ago, I put the link to the page they are shown on. If you are squeemish, don't look! But they are VERY interesting!!

*smiles*
Jan

The x-ray of your "left thigh" is upside down.  The femur (thigh) is above the knee.  Don't be embarrassed, every time an x-ray is shown in a TV show or movie it is either backwards or upside down!