Every year on the 14th of June, people all over the globe celebrate World Blood Donor Day. It is a day dedicated to raising awareness about Blood Donation, the need for safe blood and to thank donors for their voluntary acts of life-saving.
So today, on World Blood Donor’s Day, we present a set of 9 initiatives which make blood donation quick and easy for the world:
1) Help Tweet
Blood donation and blood transfusion helps save millions of lives every year. From patients suffering from life-threatening conditions to complicated maternal and perinatal care, access to safe and sufficient blood can help reduce rates of death and disability.
HelpTweet is a free platform which allows you to help save someone’s life by just your Power Of Tweets. It helps you reach out to blood donors via social media. HelpTweet brings donors in close proximity with those in need of blood.
2) Blood Network
The most crucial part of blood donation proceedings is to supply safe blood to patients at the brink of time because as the oft-quoted words go, ‘a stitch in time, saves nine’. Blood Network, an initiative that spurred on by “a life-threatening moment with fear of losing someone” became a massive drive for helping people in similar situations. It connects users based on their Blood Group, so that in an emergency, you can find a donor from your Facebook Friends or “Friends of Friends”.
3) Social Blood
In an age of instant deliveries and automatic services, even a pizza reaches us faster than the only thing that can save our life – the gift of blood. At this juncture, Social Blood steps in to resolve the situation. It is a social platform that lets us know about the blood groups of our friends along with their locations, all neatly integrated onto a map, so that in case of emergencies, it is easier to figure out whom to call first. The platform is designed to not only keep one connected with their friends, but also with the entire community so that if someone two blocks away is in need of blood, it will be immediately notified with a request and a call for action to everyone within the locality.
4) D-Health App
In India, though blood donations are carried out mostly by the helps of camps set up in different places, the biggest challenge to setting up blood repository is the authentication, identification and filtration of donors according to past eligibility records while also preserving the nature of immediacy of the blood donation process. The D-Health App developed by the Strides Software, bridges the gap between demand and supply of blood making blood drives need-based instead of occasion-based. With a single click of the mouse, it helps blood banks and organisers to reach out to blood donors while also enabling patients and hospitals to come across these organisations to procure blood in case of emergencies.
5) The Saviours
Spurred on by an incident from his own life in the event of his grandfather’s accident and crisis of blood during operation, the then 21-years old Kunal Saraff was shocked to learn that “in a country with over 65 crore eligible donors, we are not able to meet the yearly demand of one crore blood units. We are falling short by 30 lakh units!” Soon after this life-changing experience, Kolkata-boy Kunal started an organisation for emergency blood donations called The Saviours in August 2014. Starting off with a database of just ten emergency donors, The Saviours grew to connect more than 500 donors in case of emergencies in just a span of one and half years. With a mission to become the country’s largest and fastest blood donor database, these “Saviours” live by the motto: ‘when you help others, the universe conspires to help you.
6) Life Bank
Life Bank app, an intuitive blood donor database, ushers in the next generation of blood banking. An initiative that inspires interested donors to give blood and save lives in their communities, the life bank app works with nimble logistics and a delivery system that helps donors reach out to patients just in time to source for the best blood and blood products that patients need. By connecting hospitals to the best blood banks across the region, this new age blood donation database is changing the contours of African healthcare through passionate and committed approach to help you deploy technology to save lives!
7) Simply Blood
Simply Blood, the World’s First Virtual Blood Donation Platform founded by Kiran Verma and saving thousands of lives each day now, was born out of a personal tragedy in the life of its founder – the loss of his mother to cancer in the year 1992. Just like the loss of a loved one can plunge us to the depths of crippling despair it can also be the fulcrum of identifying with a greater cause instead and this was the case in Kiran’s life who after his own encounter with loss pledged to save as many lives as possible. With the launch of his app and Facebook page, Simply Blood makes it possible to get donors within the reach of just three clicks as notifications are sent to all potential donors available on that date and location. Thus, the first of its types, this virtual blood donation database is a single solution to all problems of blood collection and transfusion heralding a new age of blood donation devoid of running from pillar to post in search for the right blood group or donation.
8) Thank Bank
According to Brisbane engineering student, Samuel Eden, we live in a world where it is convenient “to like a Facebook page or sign a petition and think that the cause has been won from the comfort of your couch.” However, there’s more to it than these so called ‘slacktivists’ may think! Thank Bank was developed as a social initiative programme to get these new age slacktivists to leave their cubbyholes of comfort and come out to make real change, by alluring them with freebies and rewards for a job well done. By this rewarding people who donate blood with freebies and discounts from partner banks, Thank Bank bridges the gap between awareness and action by motivating donors across Australia to actually donate and save lives rather than just like the cause on Facebook and feel satisfied.
9) BloodLink
In the event of a medical emergency, one of the most life threatening crises is the crisis of blood. With global deficit of 40 million units a blood emergency has families of patients scouring desperately for a replacement of blood. BloodLink founded in the summer of 2016 by Amit Lohia, aims to make this sad reality a thing of the past! Unlike other blood donation websites that connect donors to patients, BloodLink focuses instead on removing the stress of locating and replacing blood for patients and their families. Alongside helping blood banks and donors to improve blood collection and exchange, BloodLink’s people centric approach also connects communities all over India to share their knowledge and experiences across a common platform thereby raising awareness and providing a space to share real stories about the problems they have faced.
World Blood Donor Day is one of the eight official global public health campaigns marked by the World Health Organization (WHO). The present world scenario is one, where the amount of blood available for donation, is much less than the required amount. Considering the prevalence of various blood-related diseases, like Leukaemia and Thalassemia, at the onset of an ever increasing population, this is a serious deficit, which has, and will always have far reaching consequences, unless the deficit is converted into surplus. With these new age blood donation programmes that use technology to revolutionise blood acquisition and exchange, we hope the contours of blood exchange may change forever and that the crisis of life may, finally, come to an end.