Rich Linton
InstantRiverside.com

Hundreds of participating law enforcement agencies throughout Southern California are laying siege in the annual Battle of the Badges blood drive, with the Riverside Police Department concluding a marathon effort on Tuesday to maintain first place in those efforts.

Calculated by the number of pints tapped from donors, RPD topped the list last year with 112 vital donations, barely edging out a Los Angeles agency by a mere 5 pints.

Red Cross Business Development Manager, Tammy Rotellini (pictured right, with Officer Neely Nakamura), explained that RPD executed a major effort in this year’s campaign.

“The goal was to exceed the 112 pints collected last year, and to maintain first place among the So Cal agencies,” Rotellini said.

According to Rotellini, the friendly, yet worthy competition was the brainchild of Los Angeles-based probation officer, Mahogany Thomas.  “She recognized the seasonal critical shortage times and put together the competition 6 years ago to help bolster the demands required before and after the holidays.”

The blood-drive was held at the RPD Magnolia station and, by 8:00 p.m., the official tally yielded 80 donations.

Numerous RPD officers from the department used lunch hours to donate, including Captain Meredyth Meredith (pictured left), while off-duty personnel and several retired officers filed in throughout the day.

Donors yesterday had the opportunity to elect the “ALYX” option, which according to the Red Cross will actually assist more potential patients.  The Alyx uses a type of technology called apheresis.

Rather than collecting the blood directly into a blood bag, the donor’s blood first flows into the Alyx machine, which separates the blood’s components.  Red blood cells are collected and kept, while the remaining components are returned to the donor.

The donor also receives a small amount of sterile saline fluid to make up for the blood volume loss.

The process takes about twice as long as a whole blood donation, which is about 20 to 25 minutes.

Photos by Rich Linton

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Wednesday, January 18, 2012

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