TEMPLE, Texas — VERIFY exists to take your questions to vetted experts, and get you answers with no spin.
A viewer named Sophie sent in this question to our VERIFY team: "I try to donate blood every 8 weeks to Baylor Scott & White. Do the recipients pay for my donation? I know there has to be a fee to pay for testing blood, salary of the phlebotomist, etc. But I donate to help people not make the hospital a profit. This is something I’ve often wondered about and I’m sure it won’t be an easy answer."
This is a really good question, with a complex answer. We decided to hit the road to get to the bottom of it.
To answer this question, it’s important to understand the process of blood donation and transfusion. We decided to pay a visit to Baylor Scott & White Medical Center to follow along start to finish.
Our expert was Dr. Walter Linz, he's the director of the blood donation center, and the transfusion service.
“We rely on healthy adults to present themselves to come and donate a unit of whole blood,” said Linz.
Blood donation is a volunteer based system, but not just anyone can stroll in off the street and donate right away. First you’re screened in the donation center.
“What we’re looking for is a number of risk factors, that would make it not good blood to transfuse,” Linz said.
Once you’ve been screened, and approved. It’s time to give.
Donors like Kim Ortiz try to give a couple times a year.
"I started when I was in nursing school," she said. "I can tolerate twenty minutes to help save somebody's life."
Once the blood is taken, it's labeled by number, packed on ice, and ready for the next step. That takes us to the production phase of the process.
Here, the blood is separated into its different elements. First, the nurse on hand, filters out the white blood cells, then puts it in a centrifuge to separate the plasma from the red blood cells. From there, a sample is taken and sent off to a lab to be tested.
"We’re looking for HIV, and Hepatitis C, and a variety of other things," said Linz. "The testing typically takes about a day.”
So far we’ve taken blood, packed and processed, and sent for tests. All those things cost money.
“You have to get the blood from the donor to the recipient, and there’s costs in all those sorts of things that are covere,” said Linz.
When the blood gets back from being tested, it still has to be matched to the patient. That takes us to transfusion.
“We need to make sure the blood type is correct, because if we give the wrong blood type it could potentially be fatal,” said transfusion service supervisor Phung Luong.
Popular VERIFY stories on KCENTV.COM
Once it’s tested and matched, the blood is ready for transfusion. It’s a necessity for patients like Skylar Gray.
"Skylar has sickle cell anemia, she was diagnosed at birth," said Skyler's mom Barbara Smith. "When she was between three to four years old, we did a transfusion once a month."
The process can mean the difference between life and death but it does come at a cost.
“You’re not buying the blood. You’re buying the bag. You’re buying the costs associated with tests, and transfusion and testing the product,” said Linz.
The cost is a recovery cost, not designed for profit, but to cover the process. It’s set by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.
"It's a fixed cost," said Linz.
So are patients being charged for the blood you donate? We can VERIFY yes, in most cases they are. But only because it takes time, money and a team effort, to make sure it helps save lives.
"We would encourage even more people to come out and donate, because there are so many people that require blood transfusions," said Smith.
And there is a huge need for blood in this country, hospitals and blood banks are always looking for more donors.
"There are fewer blood providers, and blood collectors, and fewer donor sites," said Linz. "So they have less capacity to collect blood as they did in the past."
Popular stories on KCENTV.COM