THE Davao Doctors College (DDC) lived up to its philosophy of valuing life through a bloodletting activity at the Caduceus Hall on November 26. The activity aims to collect a variety of blood types to save the lives of patients in need.
Angelica L. Torres, DDC's vice-president for Basic Education, Extension and Administration, shared in an interview with SunStar Davao that she was delighted with the spirit of volunteerism shown during the activity. The bloodletting activity is one of the highlights of the Senior High Week celebration scheduled on December 9 to 12.
"I was so overwhelmed by the spirit of volunteerism. It was not difficult to convince the students to do it. There were even very few parents who participated," Torres said.
There were a total of 174 students who enlisted themselves to be a donor. During the activity, they were able to gather a total of 84 bags of blood.
"We really saw the need for blood especially for our own community the Senior High School Community, which is the biggest population here in school in terms of students and the faculty. We already saw the problem before when there was an outbreak of dengue and so many people needed blood but because of our bloodletting, we were able to give blood to the members of our community who really did it at that moment which included even their own families," Torres said.
This activity is also another way of building wider public awareness to promote regular blood donation to maintain an adequate supply of blood for all patients requiring transfusion, especially for the senior high community and encourage the students to become voluntary blood donors. They plan of doing it annually during the Senior High School week.
"I'm just deeply overwhelmed by the spirit of volunteerism and they saw the value of this activity itself... This is going to be the community extension activity of the senior high school so it will continue in the next few years," she said.
Torres described the event, which is in partnership with Davao Blood Center, as successful.
On the same day they had three requests for blood, one of which came from the immediate family member of a student, and these were approved right away.
She further expressed her deep appreciation to the senior high community, the management, the faculty, and their partners for the successful outcome of their activity as they were able to surpass their target of 50 bags.
"It was a great feat actually. More than gathering bags, more than we targeted for, what really made me happy was the participation that this time, there were more students, there were more teachers, and we already have parents coming in," she said.