Blood Transfusions?

For anyone who has had WLS, what was your experience with blood during/after surgery? I am thnking about having a unit of my own blood stored in advance just in case. I understand it is unlikely I would need blood, however, I would like to be prepared. Also, if you were given blood during surgery, did you require more than one unit? I have also considered having my adult daughter (same blood type as me) donate a unit to be set aside for my surgery if it could possibly be necessary. Has anyone done this, donated blood in advance, for their own use?

I am still pre-op and so I can't answer your question but my advice is to check with your surgeon about how many days or weeks you should have between drawing a large amount of blood and safely having surgery. I believe when donating blood it is limited to once every 3 or 4 weeks allow the platelets and heme to replenish. Anyone please correct me if I am wrong. Elizabeth

You're right Elizabeth I was told I couldn't donate blood for 2 months before the surgery.

Hi, My date for surgery is October 19th and I donated a pint of my blood last week. After phoning my surgeon's office they made a referral to the American Red Cross. When the Red Cross called and said I could donate 35 days in advance and then again after 72 hours, which was enough time for me to reestablish my counts. Haven't decided about the second pint. At the time of my donation I was slightly anemic and below the level acceptable for annoymous donation but since it was for myself, it was within the allowable range. Because this is a self donation, it cannot be used for anyone else and will be destroyed after my surgery. Good luck to you, A Hope

A Hope, Thank you for your reply. I go for my pre-op work up tomorrow so I should get some definitive answers. I want to do the self donation if I can. Good luck to you on your surgery. Debra

I donated blood for myself for a previous surgery. It was not necessary during surgery; but since I was the only one who could benefit from it, they went ahead and gave it to me anyway. I hadn't really thought about it for this surgery. Maybe I should. Sweet T