Another success story you won't read in the pages of the Awake.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orange/os-top-blood-donor-20111218,0,4485253.story
Bruce Blunt Jr., left, and Ron Howard are pictured at Howard's Orlando home. Howard donated blood platelets to Blunt for almost 12 years, saving his life. ( Stephen M. Dowell, Orlando Sentinel )
Bruce Blunt Jr. is alive today because of Ron Howard, the most prolific donor in the history of Florida's Blood Centers and possibly one of the top in the nation.
Blunt was 5 years old when doctors gave him two weeks to live. Diagnosed with aplastic anemia, he needed medications and up to three blood transfusions a week to survive.
Enter Howard, a Belle Isle mechanic who during the past 36 years has given more than 150 gallons of blood and related components — the biggest total for a single donor in the Central Florida blood bank's 69 years, officials say.
Twenty-four times annually for nearly 12 years, Howard hooked himself to a machine that drew his platelets into plastic bags. They were transfused into Blunt, whosedisease eventually went into remission when he was 17.
Blunt, now 31 and a mechanic himself, calls Howard "a godsend."
Howard, 56, still donates platelets, which are essential for blood clotting, two dozen times a year. Typically, they go to cancer patients.
He downplays helping Blunt, as well as his contributions that have aided hundreds of people he has never met.
"It's my way of giving back, helping others," Howard said. "This is how I do it. I'm no better or different than the guy who volunteers at the soup kitchen."
Blunt sees Howard differently: "He is one of the Lord's angels."
The two have been friends since they met 21/2 decades ago at a blood-bank office. Howard was giving platelets and was amazed to learn his DNA matched up better with Blunt than even the boy's father did.
They both chuckle at the memory, in part because Howard is white and Blunt is black. Beyond the lifesaving transfusions, Blunt also remembers the times the pair would spend together fishing.
"We would talk about anything and everything," Blunt said.
The two do not see each other that often now that Blunt is a man. Through the years, he completed a four-year stint with the Army, moved to Texas and returned to Orlando.
But the bond reminds Howard how important his donations are. According to blood-bank officials, 38 percent of the U.S. population is eligible to donate blood, but fewer than 10 percent do so annually.
Howard, who gave his first pint of blood in 1975, has been able to contribute so much because he gives up to 2 pints of platelets per visit. Those can be given every two weeks and up to 24 times a year, while the wait between whole-blood contributions is 56 days.
In all, Howard has given blood or platelets 650 times.
Blood-bank spokeswoman Susan Forbes said she has contacted industry trade groups to see whether anyone else knew of a more frequent donor than Howard, but they came up with no names.
These days, Howard, whose blood type is AB positive, donates almost exclusively at the Michigan Street office of the blood bank in Orlando.
He knows virtually everyone who works there, sharing kisses, handshakes and hugs when he comes in for one of his regularly scheduled sessions.
"They're like family," he said of the staff. "In fact, I see them more than I see family."
Marcia Fletcher, a blood-bank phlebotomist who has known Howard for six years, described him as "wonderful, very nice, very patient."
He can be a bit mischievous, too. He has a habit of setting timers near empty leather donation couches to start beeping one after the other, causing employees such as Fletcher to scramble to turn them off.
"They're on to me now," said Howard, who has no children but likes to show off pictures of the six Labradors he and his wife, Joanne, own.
Howard, a former basketball player at Boone High School, stays in shape for his continual donations by eating a spinach salad for lunch daily and working out five days a week.
"All it takes is a little time and dedication," Howard said.