This week was the 12-month anniversary of the reopening of the Lismore Donor Centre which was celebrated by staff from the Summerland Bank.

The Lismore Donor Centre on Bounty Street was decimated on February 28 2022 and the rebuild took quite some time to complete but twelve months on, an improved centre with a larger capacity is kicking goals and saving lives.

Spokesperson for Lifeblood Scott Morrison told the Lismore App that one year on it has been inspirational to see how much the Lismore Community has rallied to support the Donor Centre.

"Coming towards the end of the year and after the floods, we were all feeling a bit flood fatigued and exhausted and we were really wondering how we were going to be able to come back in the Donor Centre with all those wonderful donors, and would they turn back up? And guess what, sure enough, and straightaway, as soon as we opened one year ago, they started coming back through the doors in droves."

"We are looking to build on that coming into 2024 because in this facility we now have an extra two plasma placement beds in the same footprint. Because the growth in plasma is happening at 10% a year. Plasma has just overtaken the need for blood, so the need for plasma is actually now more than the need for blood."

Scott explained plasma is used for cancer patients, elective surgeries and maternity wards for mothers and newborn babies.

"34% of plasma products go towards cancer patients, around 18% is used for elective surgeries and about 13% is used in local hospitals in the Northern NSW maternity wards"

Summerland Bank staff have been donating blood and plasma for a number of years. In 2023, they donated whole blood 21 times and plasma 15 times, saving 108 lives this year.

Branch Manager Graeme Herne has personally been donating for over 20 years.

"It's just the right thing to do, to help people out and save people's lives," Graeme said, "You do feel good after you've donated and it's always a good experience when you come into the Donor Centre. They're a great team of people."

(Summerland Bank Manager Graeme Herne with Lifeblood's Scott Morrison as staff donate blood and plasma)

"Our staff are really keen to donate, they're proud to be part of it. It's part of our Summerland Bank values and what we do as far as giving back to the community."

"We've joined the Corporate Challenge, so for the next three months, we've set ourselves a target of 40 donations, and we're really going to push hard to try and get those numbers and meet that challenge."

The corporate challenge that Graeme is talking about is the Finance Services Challenge. It runs until February 29 and the challenge has been thrown down to other financial institutions in Lismore and the Northern Rivers including the National Australia Bank, the Commonwealth Bank, Westpac/St George, Newcastle Permanent, G&C Mutual and the Greater Bank to name a few.

Thanks to the wonderful support of the Lismore community, the Lismore Donor Centre has saved 45,468 lives in 2023 with an additional 8,118 lives from the Lifeblood Mobile Pop-ups.

For those who are not going away over the Christmas/New Year period and have time off, take the time to go into the Lismore Donor Centre to donate blood or plasma.

"When you donate, it is a very rewarding, altruistic thing to do, giving back to the community. We all know someone who was touched by cancer or someone who was in need of blood or blood products in their lifetime, Scott Morrison said.

"This is a time of year when we will do a national call out because I can guarantee that there'll be a situation and blood stocks and plasma stocks will be dipping because of the number of people going on holidays and all of our regular donors are taking a well-earned break."

"So, if you've ever thought of coming in and donating and you want to be a new donor, you can donate for the first time, blood or plasma does. Come and see us, it's really easy. We'd love you to go online and register at www.lifeblood.com.au or the 13 14 95 hotline, or you can simply download the Lifeblood app on your phone."

(An example of the Lifeblood app)

"It only takes 60 minutes to give blood and 90 minutes to donate plasma. In that time, you have saved lives and you have actually given someone the opportunity to spend one more Christmas with their family together or improved significantly their quality of life. You can't put a price on that."