“Whatever you do, always give 100%. Unless you’re donating blood.”~Bill Murray. The time has come and gone once again: PDHS has held another blood drive. Paired with LifeStream Blood Bank here in the desert, all Aztecs 17 years or older were able to donate blood. Although the Palm Desert High School blood drive has ended, you can still donate blood at any of the LifeStream locations. With all the chaos that COVID-19 has introduced, the continuation of this annual blood drive can remind us all of a time when things were much more normal. However, that does not mean that LifeStream has not updated its procedures and safety. All donation locations require masks to be worn during the entire process, by both staff and donators. The process is done by appointment as to not overwhelm the workers or overfill the room. While inside, social distancing guidelines are respected and there are plenty of stations for sanitizing. All work stations are wiped down and cleaned after use, and the workers regularly wash their hands and change out their gloves, even if they aren’t the ones collecting blood. Although there are multiple new safety measures, the donation process remains the same. Donating blood is still simple and quite painless. LifeStream offers donors with the choice of donating either whole blood or apheresis donations. Whole Blood is self explanatory; the donor donates one pint of blood. However, apheresis is an automated donation process. In this process, a machine will remove whole blood, much like a normal donation, but will extract more than a pint. The blood is then inserted into a machine and it will extract either platelets, plasma, or double red cells. The donor is asked to specify what they would like the donate beforehand, and afterward the removed blood, minus the donated portion, is put back into the donor. The question may come to mind that if the workers can extract different parts of the blood, why can’t they just do that to whole blood? The answer is that they can do that, but through apheresis donation, a much more specified part can be donated. Each of the three Apheresis donation are useful in their own way. Double red cells is much like whole blood in the sense of red blood cells, but since the remaining plasma and platelets are left, much more can be donated. This form of donation is ideal for donors with type O blood, positive or negative, as well as B negative. Plasma donation is useful for various reasons, like in healing burn victims and cancer patients, and is ideal for type AB positive and negative blood types. Platelets are used for clotting within the body, and are incredibly useful. Platelet donations are ideal for type A and type B blood donors. Although it may take longer to complete these forms of donation, they’re incredibly useful. However, any type of contribution is welcomed and desired by LifeStream Blood Bank. LifeStream Blood Bank is a non-profit organization that delivers blood to 80 Southern California Hospitals. LifeStream is member of Vitalint, an organization founded in 1943 dedicated to medical transfusions. Vitalint has paired with many donation centers and aims to assist all medical agencies from coast to coast. The entire process of donation is simple, efficient, safe, and quite painless. The team will check your ability to donate, and recommend whether donating is safe and healthy for you to do. LifeStream may have completed their partnership with PDHS for the blood drive, but donations are always desired. Nothing can replicate the feeling of knowing that you may have helped save someone’s life. The gift card they send you doesn’t hurt either.