Redeeming your movie ticket online is easy! First, go to cinemark.com, select the movie you want to see, select where you want to sit and add a ticket to your cart. This should activate the payment screen, which appears as a bar on the right side of the page. Looking at this gray bar, you…

HOW BLOOD DONORS SUPPORTED A 15-YEAR-OLD’S LIVE-SAVING OPEN-HEART SURGERY On October 4, 2014, Nick Farrell* was riding high celebrating a momentous occasion: his 15th birthday. One week later, on October 11, he was grappling with a very different life-altering event: a critical surgery to fix the large hole in his heart. Though Nick and his…

Vicky Santos, Lead Laboratory Technician, returned to SBC in September after seven months overseas with the military. Krista Thomas, Communications Strategist, interviewed Vicky about this experience and her motivations to serve. Q: When did you first enlist and where and when did you serve? A: I enlisted in 2007 with the US Air Force. I…

Although the summer may be winding down, mosquito season is still upon us. Typically, the season goes from April to November in the Bay Area. This summer, Stanford Blood Center received quite a few interesting questions from blood donors about mosquitos. We thought we’d take a moment to compile our answers to those questions and,…

In June, David Polnaszek hit a special milestone with Stanford Blood Center when he made his 600th blood donation at our Menlo Park donor center. The 73-year-old Portola Valley resident has been doing his part to help save countless lives long before iPhones and even color TV… a conscious decision that was inspired by his hero. “Donating blood…

Thank you to everyone who came out to support our annual Give Good campaign! This year, for the entire month of January, we partnered with Humane Society Silicon Valley (HSSV), which has been connecting people and pets in the Silicon Valley for over 80 years. One Donation Can Save Patients and Pets In addition to...

Summer is (finally) approaching, and while that brings fun in the sun with beach days and BBQs, it also means the start of our summer blood need at Stanford Blood Center (SBC). As you may know, summer is a particularly difficult time for blood donation. Appointments to donate often drop during the summer months because…

Mother’s Day was this past weekend, and we hope you enjoyed your time with the mothers in your life! Although the day may have passed, we want to continue to appreciate moms all over by taking a moment to celebrate some of the mothers touched by blood donation that we have had the privilege to get…

Did you know that when you give blood with Stanford Blood Center (SBC), you’re not only helping local patients today, but you may also be contributing to medical research that will benefit the patients of tomorrow? During the platelet donation process for instance, white blood cells — which are not suitable for transfusion and are...

It’s time for another Volunteer Spotlight! Stanford Blood Center would be nothing without our volunteers, so it is our pleasure to help you get to know one of our wonderful helpers, former SBC Collections Manager Chiqui Lopez-Tecson. Why do you volunteer at SBC? It is an excellent organization to spend some of my time with,…

Beginning January 8, we expanded our collections to include plasma products drawn on the ALYX machine. The ALYX machine is an apheresis machine that separates and collects various blood components and returns what we aren’t using to the donor — if you’ve done a double red blood cell (DRBC) donation, then you’ve donated through the…

Tracking the Epidemic In 2016, the world was in the midst of a Zika outbreak, with the largest occurring in 2016 in Brazil and Columbia. The graph below shows the distribution of Zika cases in Central America, the Caribbean, and South America from 2015–2017. Source: Data provided by countries and territories of the Americas and...