Updates
FDA Updates to Bring in New Blood Donors Starting July 1 at South Texas Blood & Tissue Center
South Texas Blood & Tissue Center
June 30, 2020 at 5:04 pm CDT
San Antonio — Agency removes longtime blood donation deferral for military deployed to Europe
WHAT: Military veterans and their family members will be making their first blood donations at the South Texas Blood & Tissue Center Donor Pavilion after new FDA changes about donor eligibility were announced in April.
The local blood center, a subsidiary of San Antonio nonprofit BioBridge Global, updated multiple questionnaires and procedures during a time when it also changed the way it hosts community blood drives and launched its COVID-19 convalescent plasma program. Like all blood centers in the United States, STBTC is required to follow FDA guidelines about donor eligibility.
WHO: The first blood donors will be Tiffany Kieschnick-Rivas and her family, who lived in Germany when her father was in the military. Tiffany is alive today because of fast-acting community members, first responders, and blood donors.
- Weeks after her car accident and traumatic cardiac arrest, doctors told Tiffany there had been little chance she would survive her injuries.
- But after a transfusion of whole blood en route to the hospital, Tiffany became responsive – shocking her paramedics, who had never experienced such a case.
- Tiffany and her family are paying it forward now that they are eligible to donate and hope to help patients in need.
WHEN: Wednesday, July 1, 10 a.m.
WHERE: STBTC Donor Pavilion6211 IH 10 West at First Park Ten Boulevard, San Antonio, TX 78201
