One question has plagued the field of blood donation for as long as there have been transfusions: Are we harming blood donors by taking blood from them?
Our iron stores are largely self-conserved: Our bodies recycle iron from old red blood cells to make new red blood cells. Iron that’s in use doesn’t tend to exit the body unless a person loses blood, whether through menstruation, bleeding from trauma, illness — or through donation.
Eldad Hod, associate professor of pathology and cell biology and vice chair of laboratory medicine at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, led a study investigating whether the blood from iron-deficient repeat blood donors continued to meet Food and Drug Administration standards, and whether low-iron status affected the donors’ quality of life or cognitive ability.
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Hod and his team of researchers were surprised to find that there was not a measurable effect on either the blood’s transfusion quality, the iron-deficient donors’ cognitive performance, or their quality of life compared to the iron-replete donors.
“The answer doesn’t fit our preconception, but is actually better for public health because it suggests that what we’re doing is not harming our donors,” said Steven Spitalnik, executive vice chairman for laboratory medicine at Columbia’s department of pathology and cell biology and a co-author on the paper.
