Kiwanis blood drive a success

WASHINGTON — The Washington Kiwanis AM’ers held a blood drive Thursday, where organizers said people donated about as much blood as the community uses in a typical year.

The drive was one of several run through nonprofit ImpactLife, which is based in Davenport and supplies hospitals in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois and Missouri. The organization tries to hold one in each recipient community roughly every two months, coordinating with a rotation of local volunteer groups.

“I believe the goal was 72 units of blood, and when I checked we had 104 people show up for their appointments,” Blood Drive Coordinator Dan Tweeton said. “We had a great number of people turn out … I’m glad it went well for Impact Life, it was just a good overall drive.”

ImpactLife Account Manager Chris Ciasto said every donation affected multiple patients on the receiving end.

“We’ll take a bag of blood and put them in a centrifuge, so then we can spin them into several components: red cells, platelets, plasma, and a fourth product called cryoprecipitate,” she said. “So when we say one unit of blood can impact three to four patients, that’s how. If we collect 80 today, you can take that times three, say 240 patients will be impacted by the blood collected today, which is about as much as your hospital uses in an entire year.”

The next ImpactLife blood drive in Washington is set for Thursday, Oct. 12, from 1:30-6:30 p.m. at UP Church, according to Ciasto.

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