platelets

After receiving a call for blood donation for an old JC mate going through chemo for leukemia, I popped by Singapore General Hospital to see if blood in my arteries were of any use. On Monday I sat through a two hour process to filter out some platelets from my blood.

Amazing process - a machine pumps blood out from me, separates the platelets (which are beige, not red!), then returns the blood - less platelets - into the same vein. The machine does this seven times. Each time the blood returns, there is a light tingle about my lips. Odd eh? It was a painless process even though the nurse said there might be discomfort or even pain when the blood returns from the machine. I didn't even feel a pinch when they poked the needle in. Kudos to the nurse - very experienced hands.

Nurse said I have good blood - plenty of platelets (something about a standard of 4.0 and mine was 5.0 - whoopee... i think). Wonder why it takes forever to stop the bleeding when i cut myself shaving...

After two hours you think there would be a nice heavy bag of platelets, look at that picture - hardly enough to fill a glass!