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Hospital Makes Visitors Give Blood

So..you want to visit a loved one in the hospital? Well...prepare your arm well, because in a hospital in Chile you cannot visit them if you do not donate some blood first!
But the hospital claims the policy is 'normal' and is practised by many hospitals....

https://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1274406.html

Blood Give Visitors Hospital

From the article: "We do this because we don't have enough blood to satisfy the demand."

While I understand the desperate need for blood I don't think that this is the best way to recruit 'donations'. Also, just because this is a 'normal' practice and many hospitals do it does not make it right. Many people are afraid of needles and should not be forced to do something so uncomfortable. People should face their fears when they are ready. Next, what if someone has a medical reason not to be required to donate? Even something as simple as being sick at the moment and not feeling well enough to donate. The person may not be believed, and though proof could be brought for some conditions, people who are ill could be forced into giving blood. No one is a better judge of how I'm feeling than me. Last of all, my biggest concern is the spread of AIDS and other diseases. I know that there are good screening policies in place, but still they are not infallible. If someone is forced to give their blood, who is to say that they will be honest on the questionnaire about their past history? Some diseases are not detectable yet, but can still be carried in the blood. If I personally had to visit someone in a hospital where a blood donation was required, I would do it because I can, unless I was ill or another reason. I have O negative blood, which could be used by anyone, and is very desirable for hospitals to have on hand at all times. I have wondered before, though, what exactly can be passed on through someone's blood. Something not necessarily physical. For example, let's say I have mental illness, which has been found to be genetically connected to relatives. Can something like this be passed along? Probably not, but I don't know for sure. I can understand the urgent need for blood donations, but I think that there are better ways to go about it than through legal force.

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Forcing someone to donate blood in order to visit a patient at a hospital is absolutely insane! How can it be legal in any "free" country. You are holding people hostage in such situations.

Blood Give Visitors Hospital

That's completely unethical. As was mentioned, some people are scared to death of needles. I am completely needle phobic, and that is the only thing that has kept me from giving blood since I was old enough to do so.

They have no legal basis to force people to do something of that nature in order to visit a patient. I know that hospitals ask friends and family to donate when a person is admitted and need blood, but until they point out a law that has been passed by the government of any country, then they technically have no way of fullfilling that requirment.

I hope they do get a wake up call from this lawsuit.

Blood Give Visitors Hospital

This gets even more interesting when you consider that there are a lot of people from whom the Red Cross and most hospitals won't even consider taking blood. Do you want a hospital to take the blood of a person who is HIV positive? How about someone with leukemia?

I cannot donate blood because I lived in Europe for over six months since 1980, and since I donated a kidney.

Pretty strange thing going on there.

Hospital Makes Visitors Give Blood

I suppose it's one way of bringing up the blood supplies, but I think that it should be voluntary not mandatory.

In reality, the hospitals do have an upper hand with this, and if dealt with sensitively, and explained about the dire shortages of blood, my guess would be that they would get quite a lot of willing candidates who wouldn't want the blood supplies to run out whilst their loved one was in hospital.

The other side to this, is that this would be the greatest opportunity to get close matching blood types that they are ever going to get, including the rarer blood groups, as most of the people visiting would be relatives with the same blood type!

Summed up, I would say it has been handled all wrong, because they are so desperately short of blood, but done correctly and voluntarily they could have a great opportunity to really get plenty of donors.

Hospital Visitors Give Blood

Wow...lucky this is not in the US. The first time someone was forced to give blood and had any health problem or accident afterwards that could be linked back to the "donation", the hospital would no longer be able to afford insurance following the lawsuit. Chilean law must be much more forgiving to the hospitals in this case!

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I can sympathize with the hospitals need but their tactics are way out of line. I do think that the hospitals should place more donation advertisement in them however to encourage donations. OK it is almost a low blow but a person visiting a sick relative is likely to donate then then any other time and more people who donate the better chance of repeat donors. I would also encourage plasma, organ, bone marrow advertisement in hospitals.