Blood Donation Organization
Sankalp BDO activities
On World Blood Donation Day
Every day numerous children suffering from thalassemia, pregnant women, individuals who met with accidents, people in deed of surgery, people fighting cancer and many more patients receive the gift of life donated by unknown voluntary blood donors.
Thank you blood donors for being there for them.
Your Selfless contribution preserves hope, gifts smiles and saves lives!
KEEP GIVING FREELY. GIVE OFTEN. BLOOD DONATION MATTERS.
Challenges with Voluntary Platelet Apheresis
When Sankalp got it's first request for platelet apheresis, little was known and understood about the procedure. We got the volunteers to donate platelets first and then gradually made progress towards educating the regular blood donors as well as building the country's first voluntary platelet database. The volunteers of the organisation spent good amount of time learning the use case and benefits of single donor platelets (SDP) in particular and apheresis technique in general.
Replacement Donor Card - A Certificate of Shame
NACO claims 80% voluntary blood donation already and aims at achieving 85% in 2014-15. Unfortunately, right under the government's nose, at an institution which government wants the nation to look up-to and learn from - the message of voluntary blood donations seems to have no takers.
The above card is one of the four such cards a patient presented to a voluntary organisation last week demanding that they be given blood since they had provided replacement blood earlier in the year.
Expanding the Bombay blood group network
Sankalp India Foundation has an Emergency Team which works to ensure that people who do not find blood from the blood banks are helped. The team works on corner cases of blood transfusion medicine and extremely rare blood group requests. The team has been handling BBG requests for last 6 years.
Ethical and legal considerations in blood donor counselling
While voluntary blood donation camps are improving in terms of their adherence to national and global standards are concerned, a major area which continues to remain neglected is that of donor counselling. Most blood banks do not have a trained counsellor to attend the drives and even those who take up the responsibility lack the necessary focus and skill. We share in this article the ethical and legal considerations in blood donor counseling as indicated in the Implementation Guidelines for Blood donor Counselling by World Health Organisation.
Thal Meet-Up
The news of a child being born with thalassemia devastates the family. More grueling is the struggle to find the way ahead for disease management. Each family was forced to wage their own battle and find their way through. The situation is most difficult for the poor and the illiterate parents.
On World Thalassemia Day
Sankalp India Foundation has been involved with Thalassemia management for 3 years now but walking into the thalassemia day care is not an easy thing for me. I love to interact with the children and the families, try to reassure them, help them with their doubts, listed to them, and see their smiles. However, what sticks to my mind more is the occasional sigh of child with bad complications associated with improper thalassemia management.
Lets get together to map the prevalence of thalassemia in Karnataka
Sankalp India Foundation(S.I.F.) has been working for voluntary blood donation since 2003. Since 2011 S.I.F. has also taken up the cause of thalassemia management and cure. In last 2 years the organisation has supported more than 400 children with thalassemia through 2 thalassemia day care centers in Bangalore, one at Indira Gandhi Institute of Child Health and the other at Rashtrotthana Parishat.
Online Blood Donor Databases - Philanthropy or Business
Internet and social media is touching all areas of life. How could blood banking remain untouched. Numerous blood donor registries have mushroomed with claims to provide easy access to blood donors at the time of need. Fancy solutions making intelligent use of social media and vicinity based search have been in the news. Promoted by individuals coming from prestigious academic institutions and decorated by national and international awards and recognitions, these solutions appear promising.