LEBANON, N.H. — Al Whitney isn’t your typical traveler. At 87, he’s completing his third tour of all 50 United States.
But, he said, he’s not interested in seeing the sights. Instead, his goal is to donate blood in every state he visits.
On Wednesday, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in New Hampshire was his 29th stop.
“I’m doing it again. Hopefully the Lord will let me finish. He got me into it,” he said.
Counting Wednesday’s donation, Whitney said he will have contributed 1,145 units of platelets. He said one unit is about 2 tablespoons, which means he’s donated almost 9 gallons of platelets. Sometimes called the Band-Aids of the blood, platelets help form blood clots to prevent and treat bleeding.
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Those donations provide a lifesaving intervention to people whose platelet counts are dangerously low, including people with cancer or those suffering from an acute traumatic injury.
Whitney expects his tour of the country to take a few years because he can only donate 24 times in a 12-month period, per US Food and Drug Administration rules.
Whitney said he first started donating blood in 1965 after walking past a sign that read “Donate Blood” in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. After making a donation, he said, he heard a voice telling him, “Al, you can do more than this.”
In the years since, he’s gone on to do much more, organizing blood drives for the next 35 years. After retiring from his manufacturing job in 2000, Whitney began touring around the United States with the goal of raising awareness and encouraging other people to donate alongside him.
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Whitney said he uses his Social Security to pay for travel expenses, and he has no idea how much he’s spent on the efforts over the years. A “cheap” trip, like his visit to New Hampshire, might cost him about $500, he estimated. He said he’s trying to visit states in the Northeast during the summer months, when there’s no snow, and he’s planning to visit Maine, Vermont, and Massachusetts soon. While he has established a nonprofit called Platelets Across America, he said the donations are minimal.
On Wednesday, medical staff instructed Whitney to sit for 100 minutes, connected to a medical device that separates the platelets from his blood, and then returns his blood to his body.
How does he feel afterward? “Fine!”
When he’s done, he plans to get back into his 2015 Chrysler Town & Country and start the 10-hour drive back to Cleveland. He said he spends the time talking to his wife, who died 14 years ago, and God.
“He’s incredible and kind of inspiring, really,” Dr. Richard M. Kaufman said about Whitney. Kaufman works with Dartmouth’s Blood Donor Program and has a board certification in blood banking.
Kaufman said Whitney isn’t alone — there’s actually “a very dedicated, relatively small group” of people who make donations like clockwork every two weeks, including some who started donating after a loved one was on the receiving end of a donation.
“They’ll schedule vacations around their platelet donation,” Kaufman said. “It’s a really big deal for them.”
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There’s an ongoing need for donations, since the country only has about a two-day supply of blood at a given time, according to Kaufman. Maintaining the inventory is challenging, since it only has a five-day shelf life, and it takes about 48 hours to process.
Each donation yields about three adult doses of platelets, according to Kaufman.
“You’ll never know what happens to a unit,” he said, “but you actually can help save a life.”
Amanda Gokee can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her @amanda_gokee.