Before your blood donation:
Get plenty of sleep the night before you plan to donate.
Eat a healthy meal before your donation. Avoid fatty foods, such as a hamburger, fries or ice cream.
Drink plenty of water before the donation.
Check to see if any medications you are taking or recently took would prevent you from donating. For example, if you are a platelet donor, you must not take aspirin for two days prior to donating. Talk to your doctor before discontinuing any medications.
Wear a shirt with sleeves that can be rolled up.
What you can expect
Before the procedure
Before you can donate blood, you will be asked to fill out a confidential medical history that includes questions about behaviors known to carry a higher risk of bloodborne infections — infections that are transmitted through the blood.
Because of the risk of bloodborne infections, not everyone can donate blood. The following are a few high-risk groups that are not eligible to donate blood:
Anyone who has used injected drugs, steroids or another substance not prescribed by a doctor in the past three months
Men who have had sexual contact with other men in the past three months
Anyone who has a congenital coagulation factor deficiency
Anyone who has had a positive test for HIV
Anyone who has engaged in sex for money or drugs in the past three months
Anyone who, in the past 12 months, has had close contact with — lived with or had sexual contact with — a person who has viral hepatitis
Anyone who has had babesiosis, a rare and severe tick-borne disease, or the parasitic infection Chagas' disease
You will also have a brief physical exam, which includes checking your blood pressure, pulse and temperature. A small sample of blood is taken from a finger prick and is used to check the oxygen-carrying component of your blood (hemoglobin level). If your hemoglobin concentration is normal and you've met all the other screening requirements, you can donate blood.