18th April, 2017
The Commissioner for Health in Gombe State, Dr Kennedy Ishaya, says the state government has been seeking an alternative power supply to preserve the blood bank at its Specialist Hospital in Gombe.
Ishaya said on Tuesday that the deplorable state of electricity supply in the state had become a major factor hindering the preservation of blood.
He also said that frequent cases of emergency had made the demand for blood donations to be high.
“Blood demand is always high following the frequent emergencies, hence, the need for more donors to salvage the situation.
“Since we do not have steady power supply to preserve the blood donated by individuals or organisations, we don’t encourage keeping it for long.’’
Ishaya said that whenever there was an emergency, the medical doctors would screen the patient.
After that, they would go to the blood bank to look for the patient’s blood group and do the transfusion before replacing it.
The commissioner also said that it was very rare to get the 0-negative-blood type among the people of Gombe.
“Whenever we are in need of this type of blood, we have to travel to as far as Numan in Adamawa to get people to donate.
“Before collecting the blood donations; we will conduct an immunological test on each donor, check his or her immune antigens to ensure that such blood is healthy,’’ he said.
Ishaya, however, said that there was a functional blood bank at the Federal Teaching Hospital, Gombe, that had been serving those patronising it.