At least donors a year are needed, and organizers say they can be hard to find. As a college student in Illinois, Robin Smith was a regular blood donor who considered it a civic duty to open her veins.

The Twisted Business of Donating Plasma - The Atlantic

Instead of offering a routine sample of blood or plasma to be used in transfusions, Smith signed up to provide peripheral blood stem cells, or PBSCs, the less-well-known cells that are in crucial demand for scientific research. I was very happy to do it.

Shelly Heimfeld, a scientific director at Fred Hutch and Seattle Cancer Care Alliance SCCA , where the donations are collected. Blood stem cells, identified in the early s, were the first type of stem cells discovered and launched a new era of research.

Like other stem cells, they can copy themselves, differentiate into specialized cells and undergo cell death — functions that make them critical research tools for scientists. Investigators studying diseases as diverse as cancer and sickle-cell anemia have relied on the Hutch cells, which have also been used in research for more than 50 papers published in leading journals in the past five years, Heimfeld added.

Heimfeld runs the year-old program — funded through a grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases — that collects PBSCs and provides them to dozens of researchers across the country.

The nonprofit Hutch program is one of the largest in the nation to collect and sell the cells. Last year, about local donors at Fred Hutch provided billions of cells to more than outside investigators not only in the U. The PBSCs are collected through a process called leukapheresis, which removes blood through one arm, separates out white blood cells, and returns the blood to the donor.

Some people have reactions to the shots, which can cause joint aches and flu-like symptoms, but Smith said she felt fine. From those, scientists can request specific components, such as T cells and B cells, which play a key role in immunity. They might order a batch of 20 million or 40 million T cells, for instance, for use in an experiment. Finding enough donors to supply the cells is a constant challenge, said Sharvari Joshi, who helps manage recruitment.

For every successful donor, seven people have to be screened. Donors must be between the ages of 18 and 70 and in good health, plus they must meet typical criteria for donating blood products. It appears safe, researchers said. Ravi Prasad, 37, a Community Transit worker from Marysville, has donated PBSCs twice, both times on his birthday, after learning about the opportunity at a backyard barbecue. Although he did develop flu-like symptoms from the shots, he said he welcomed the chance to share his cells.

As an immigrant from Fiji, he said he felt an obligation to give back to the community that welcomed him. The opinions expressed in reader comments are those of the author only, and do not reflect the opinions of The Seattle Times.

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How to Make Money Donating Plasma - Wallet Hacks

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Health Log In Subscribe. Originally published January 1, at 6: Nurse Maria Liza Pamintuan works at the bed of Seattle resident Robin Smith as she donates peripheral blood stem cells at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance on Nov. Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Columbia City, I hear you loud and clear Nicole Brodeur Unlimited Digital Access. No personal attacks or insults, no hate speech, no profanity.

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