Doctors, piercing, and bloodborne pathogens

[Alyssa M.]

I want to get my ears pierced.

I also want to donate blood to my local blood bank.

If I go to a parlor or mall stand, I can't give blood for a year. I don't blame them, because I heard about an outbreak of Hepatitis C at a local parlor. But the local blood center says it's okay if I go to a doctor's office.

Has anyone done this? How much does it cost? Does this make sense?

[lizbeth]

are you planning to donate blood more than once or something? can't you just donate blood and then get your ears pierced afterwards?

[Alyssa M.]

If I do it anywhere but a doctor's office, they won't let me donate for another year. I donated about three weeks ago, and the next time I can go is early January, unless I get a piercing or tattoo (or travel to a country with malaria, or have sex with a prostitute, or spend a year in Britain developing mad cow disease, or get pregnant, or have sexual contact with a man without taking my Delorean for a spin back to 1976, etc.).

I have been trying to motivate myself to donate blood for years, but the needle-in-your-vein part of it has always made it really not work; I had a few bad experiences before, because I'd freak out. But getting my blood drawn a bunch of times for lab work for hrt has made me get over the panic and the queezy feeling, and so it's not nearly such a big deal anymore. I just have a personal conviction that if you are able to donate blood, you are all but morally obligated to do so. Now that I'm able (i.e., I'm not so tense that they can't get a decent line in or that I faint afterwards), I don't want to waste another year because of my vanity.

[Hannah]

Do they give you a hard time about hrt? I'm used to getting stuck, it might be nice to do some good with it for once.

[lizbeth]

I thought that if you were on HRT you weren't able to donate blood? silly reason, but I thought I heard that somewhere.

I admire you for donating blood. I'm not able to donate since I had jaundice as a baby.

if you get pierced by a doctor, do you just pay your copay and the doctor shoves a needle in your ear? it just seems really odd to go to a doctor's office for a piercing and I've never heard of such a thing. I'm curious though.

[Pippa]

The rules in the UK also stop you giving blood after getting pierced.  It is a sensible safety precaution to stop blood born infection.   It doesn't mean you can never give blood again, you just have to wait for a bit.

As for the Mad Cow Disease, Britain stopped cattle over three years of age being put into the human food chain several years ago.   No British beef should contain the pathogen as it has been eliminated from the food chain.

There has still been no proof of BSE evolving in to a human disease and the number of cases of cj disease, the human equivalent has remained fairly constant.   If BSE had transferred to Humans, we would now be starting to see a large increase in the number of human cases.   This is not the case.

Britain now has the most stringent rules in the world relating to the traceability of Beef and beef products.   I believe in France it was referred to as Bulldozer disease as farmers would just kill and bury cattle without telling the authorities.

I enforce the Beef traceability legislation as part of my job.   France's position is more to do with protecting their own market than the safety of British beef.

I know I went off topic but I do know a bit about the subject of BSE.

[sd]

Check the rules for where you plan to donate.
Every country and often every center, has different rules about donating.

There are tons of rumors and miss-information.
I too had heard about hrt disqualifying you as well as others, then went and looked and most restrictions were just plain false. Some may be old information, some may have just been lies, soem may only apply to certain centers and countries.

[insanitylives]

if you know you don't have any diseases, why not just say you've had the piercings longer?

It's not like anyone can prove it...and they test the blood anyway.

[Alyssa M.]

First, to clarify:

Yes, I donated blood. Within the last month. And I specifically asked them about all my concerns. So I know the regulations.

On the issue of HRT:

Dutasteride and finasteride are on the FDA's list of drugs that prevent you from donating blood. Estradiol and spironolactone are not. The only drug I'm taking that they had any issue with was aspirin. I think the idea is that if you have been taking pain killers, there might be some medical condition you don't know about, but I'm not sure. They were fine with the explanation that I take a low dose daily to help mitigate the slightly increased risk of blood clots due to liver processing of oral estradiol.

The center specifically called me to make sure that they addressed the comment I left them about using the correct pronouns and name, since the process is very gendered, and therefore more uncomfortable for me. So I can only assume that they really do want me to donate blood. They mentioned that there was another trans woman who donates there; she donated there before her transition as well. I specifically asked about piercings in that call, and they said I would have to wait a year to donate again, unless I did it at a doctor's office. No exceptions. And I won't lie about it.

On the issue of the reasonability of regulations:

Certainly there are some overreactions. The BSE issue is one, and so is the lifetime ban for men who have had sex with men. Supposing I have SRS and then have sex with a man ... who the hell knows how that would play. But that's not going to happen, since I'm just not into guys, so it's a moot point. It's stupid, and they need to get rid of that regulation. HIV is a huge problem, but there has to be a better way to deal with it.

The thing about tests is that, for instance, with HIV, you can be positive but test negative for many months after you contract the virus. This is true for a number of other diseases as well. That's why the regulations for tattoos and piercings (a one year ban) make sense. So I'm not going to donate if I get a piercing anywhere but a doctor's office.

So back to my original question:

I guess I'll just try to figure it out and I'll report back once I do that.

[Hannah]

That's interesting about the dht inhibitors, but it makes complete sense.

Anyway here in Oregon you have to have your ears done in a doctors office. I drove over to Idaho for mine, but it turns out the local doc that does it charges the same as the place I went too, so it was a waste of gas. All told in the doctors office it would have cost $30.

[Katie.D]

Apologies for editing, if it is offensive on this board I apologise and won't do it again.  MediSystems supplies kits to physicans - you could contact them and ask if there is a local MD who uses their products
http://www.medisystem.com/US/guid.369995740/~/categoryL1.74/~/categoryL2.39/~/categoryL3.138/MEDI/product_category.html
Katie

First, to clarify:

. I specifically asked about piercings in that call, and they said I would have to wait a year to donate again, unless I did it at a doctor's office. No exceptions. And I won't lie about it.

...................
So back to my original question:

I guess I'll just try to figure it out and I'll report back once I do that.

A

[sd]

The only drug I'm taking that they had any issue with was aspirin.

Most likely it is because asparin is a blood thinner.
Putting that blood into someone who has a clotting issue or internal bleeding could be bad.

[Alyssa M.]

They're not worried about aspiring being transfused; the amounts in one pint of my blood would be so small it wouldn't make any difference. They are, however, worried about tiny amounts of dht inhibitors, because they can cause birth defects, which is also why people taking those drugs are supposed to be very careful not to contaminate others with dust from the pills. I got the impression the only reason they cared was that I might be taking the aspirin for some other issue that would disqualify me. They were fine with the prophylactic use in conjunction with oral estradiol.