By Frederic Klein

When I started working for the American Red Cross, I was a little embarrassed to admit that I had never donated blood. I never really had a good reason for not doing it — just a general aversion to needles and a series of rationalizations about why it was OK for me not to donate. As I learned more about blood donation, such as the fact that only 3% of age-eligible people in the United States donate blood and that red blood cells can only be stored for up to 42 days (and platelets only up to five days). I went online to the Red Cross’s website to find and book an appointment.

I also started to talk to my friends about whether they had ever donated or received blood.

One of those friends is Dylan Goldberg, 36, who I’ve known for nearly a decade. Dylan uses a prosthetic leg due to injuries sustained in a near-fatal car crash while he was in high school. Conceptually, I knew that he had been a blood recipient, but I had never asked him for the details. After my donation, he shared his story with me. It made me see very clearly how donating blood can save lives.

When Dylan was 17, he was a competitive lightweight rower at his high school in Westport, Connecticut. He exercised religiously, was in great physical condition and had just bought a car with money that he’d saved from working summer jobs.

One Friday night, as he was driving home from a day at the beach, a deer suddenly appeared on the road a few feet in front of him. He swerved, missing the deer but slamming his car into a telephone pole. Dylan was trapped in a crumpled heap of metal, wood, and airbags. The fire department arrived with the Jaws of Life, and it took them an hour and a half to free him from the wreck.

“I don’t really remember it,” Dylan recalled as we ate lunch together after my appointment. “Apparently, from what people at the accident said, I was screaming my lungs off, but I thankfully do not recall that part. The first thing I do remember after my car accident was when I was at Norwalk Hospital, about two weeks later, a bunch of my friends had come to see me, including the girl I had just taken to prom a couple months earlier. She passed out when she saw me and cracked the window with her head. And then they put her in the ICU bed right in front of me for a few hours.”

The way Dylan frames his story, it’s amazing that he is still here to tell it. In the first two weeks after his accident, he received around 150 units of blood due to the amount of internal bleeding that he had. For context, a standard whole blood donation (such as the one I made recently) collects one unit or one pint of blood.

Dylan spent 18 months in the hospital — the first nine months consecutively — while he recovered from the crash. Doctors did everything they could to try to save his damaged left leg, but after 15 weeks it became apparent that in order to save Dylan’s life, the leg would have to be amputated. In the end, with all the procedures he had, Dylan received more than 200 units of blood — meaning that it took 200 people making a standard whole blood donation to help save Dylan’s life.

After the accident, it was clear that Dylan was not able to row competitively anymore and he turned his focus to other passions. Instead of focusing on colleges where he might captain a crew team, he went to Johns Hopkins University as a pre-med student, receiving a bachelor’s degree in public health and a master’s degree in toxicology. He started at University of Maryland’s medical school, getting partway through his doctoral program before realizing that he had spent enough time in hospitals already and didn’t want to be a doctor anymore. He pivoted instead to other aspects of the medical profession that are more focused on helping healthcare professionals stay up to date on the latest developments in their field.

He also stays informed about the blood supply to hospitals.

“You know, there are places in the world right now — and places even in America — where the whole ICU probably doesn’t have 150 units of blood in stock at any one time,” Dylan said. “There’s a real need for blood out there, and anyone who can donate blood — they should.”

One of the great things about the Red Cross Blood Donor App is that donors can see where their donated blood ends up. Mine went to Santa Clara, CA. I don’t know who it helped or why they needed it, but I know it went to someone in need. Perhaps that person was in a car accident, like Dylan, or maybe they were a premature baby or maybe they were a new mother. It’s possible he or she had cancer or sickle cell or some other medical condition where blood transfusions are vital.

Knowing I had done something to help someone I don’t even know made me feel good. I hope my story will inspire others to do the same. As Dylan says, “The life you save could be mine.”

Every two seconds, someone in the U.S. needs blood. Schedule an appointment today by visiting www.redcrossblood.org.