The practice has kept him out of the reach of lifestyle diseases like diabetes and heart ailments
The IMA will honour him on October 7 for the service in connection with the Blood Donation Week
KOCHI: A regular blood donor to the IMA Blood Bank ever since it started operations three decades ago in Kochi, Roy J. Kappen, made it 50 donations the other day to IMA alone. Having the rare blood group of ‘A negative’, he started donating blood during his college days and may have had over 100 blood donations altogether.
The IMA will honour him on October 7 for the service in connection with the Blood Donation Week. Roy, who started blood donation when he was still in college, believes that the practice has kept him out of the reach of lifestyle diseases like diabetes and heart ailments.
“Regular blood donation clears the excess iron content in blood and this can be an effective shield against heart ailments,” Roy told Deccan Chronicle. He kept on donating blood even when he worked in Abu Dhabi and Singapore.
“I have never kept a count of how many times I donated blood. But definitely it goes over 100. IMA, however, kept a count and they are gracious enough to organise a function to honour me and others like me,” he said.
As his blood group is a rare one, with every donation IMA takes care to fix the date for the next visit immediately after the mandatory three-month gap. Roy, who lives in Puthiyakavu near here, said that his family, comprising wife Alice and college-going children Riya and Reena, was fully supportive of his humanitarian mission.
( Source : dc )
Next Story
