blood disorders
Special Blood Donation and Transfusion Procedures
Plateletpheresis (platelet donation)
In plateletpheresis, a donor gives only Platelets rather than whole blood. Whole blood is drawn from the donor, and a machine that separates the blood into its components selectively removes the platelets and returns the rest of the blood to the donor. Because donors get most of their blood back, they can safely give 8 to 10 times as many platelets during one of these procedures as they would give in a single donation of whole blood. They can also give platelets more often, once every 3 days (but no more than 24 donations during a year). Collecting platelets from a donor takes about 1 to 2 hours, compared with collecting whole blood, which takes about 10 minutes. 