The Tauranga Donor Centre is celebrating a milestone - one year since the option to donate plasma returned to the centre.

On Thursday, the New Zealand Blood Service celebrated its one year anniversary of the reintroduction of the plasma donation process to Tauranga, allowing donors to give more blood more often.
Recruiter Lesley Sinclair hands over a celebratory cupcake to donor Phil McDonald for Tauranga Donor Centre's first anniversary of plasma donations.

Plasmapheresis - the donation of plasma – the liquid component of blood that contains proteins, clotting factors and electrolytes, was brought back to the centre following the request of Tauranga residents who were requesting the service to be available for about 12 years.

Prior to the creation of New Zealand Blood Service, Tauranga used to have a dedicated panel of plasma donors when they were based at the Tauranga Hospital.

The plasma service was suspended when NZBS was formed and the service relocated away from the hospital.

Tauranga Donor Centre team leader Annemarie Pidwell is pleased the centre has reached the one year mark with the number of donators exceeding initial expectations.

'It's very exciting. We're very pleased that we've got there. It's been a big commitment for the staff involved because there's been extra training that's had to happen in different cities.

'And we've had a very good response from our donors. So we're very happy with getting to the one year. We've made our mark now within the organisation that it can be done.”

Annemarie says initially, the centre hoped for at least 10 donors per week. One year on, there are 139 plasma donors at the Tauranga centre – that's as many as 30 donors per week, says Annmarie.

'We probably expected half of that and we weren't expecting to be doing up to 30 [donations] a week either after a year.

'So we have exceeded our initial goals. But we had such a great response from the donors that it just built up so quickly and the staff were very keen to embrace that. So it was a good team between the donors and the staff. It was excellent.”

Donating plasma is an automated process where instead of donating whole blood, the donor gives only a certain part or component - plasma.

The donor's blood is collected, the red blood cells and plasma are separated and the red blood cells are returned to the donor using a process called apheresis.

Annemarie says the procedure takes about 60 minutes after donors pass the criteria.

She says donors must be a specific weight and height and have 'good veins”. All donors must have given blood before.

Annemarie wants to express her gratitude towards the staff and donors who have helped the centre reach their one year anniversary.

'We hope we can continue on doing what we're doing and supplying Tauranga with such a necessary product.”

If you are interested in donating plasma at the Tauranga Donor Centre contact 578 2194 or 0800 GIVEBLOOD to make an appointment.

Registered nurse Angela Durham takes plasma from donor Phil McDonald at his 12^th donation. He has visited the Tauranga Donor Centre 34 times, donating both blood and plasma.

The plasma is separated from the whole blood with an Apheresis machine.