Lifesource

Not surprised there’s a shortage when they treat donors so rudely on the phone. I called to ask if they were open just before Christmas and they hung up on me. You know who is doing whom a favor? Geez!!!

I often donate platelets. Here the staff is very friendly and remember people who donate often. It makes you feel good to greeted like an old friend. The staff is very professional and take their work very seriously. I actually look forward to going. Thanks guys.

Horribly managed company. The Rosemont management is without a doubt the meanest management of any company I worked for. There was talk of the management bugging offices and the drivers break room with listening devices. The management rules out of fear tactics.
I worked there as a distribution driver for three years. I like to think I did a near perfect job. Problems that I saw while working there were, drivers at times becoming absent minded, bringing the wrong blood orders to the wrong hospitals. Blood units being left in the work vehicle at night, and spoiling, damaged blood units. I will go so far as to say I was witness to instances of FDA mistakes.
Lifesource in my opinion uses blood donations to keep their 403b non-​for profit status. From day one, the supervisor in the distribution department told me to «watch my back» and «dot every I and cross every T» My co-​workers were mostly ok, however there were a handful of very mean spirited people working there, that were the source of very mean gossip and hearsay. This led me to resign in good standing and perfect work performance.
In addition I feel their system of blood and blood product delivery is very lax. Honestly, they transport the blood and blood products in Igloo lunch coolers! Quite odd and insecure in hindsite. I know for a fact that at another blood bank which I worked for as a medical courier, the other blood bank seals their boxes of blood in the lab. These sealed boxes are ONLY opened by the blood bank technician receiving the units at the hosptial. The Igloo lunch coolers used by Lifesource to transport their units can be opened anytime enroute… just an FYI.
Also if you are on Lifesource’s blood donation list, make sure you use a fake phone number. I have had three people I know ask me if I knew of a way have their phone number taken off the list! Lifesource keeps calling them all the time since they donated!
Horrible management glad to be away from there!

Do not give these people any personal information. Once they have your phone number, they won’t stop calling you. Despite requesting they not call me, they keep calling, sometimes more than once a day. To me that is a sign of a very poorly run agency.

David is always so nice! He makes the process very calming!

If you donate with them, use a fake number. The donation process is fairly simple and straight forward, but they will call you every single day sometimes repeatedly and from different numbers. Telling them to stop does not matter. They continue to call anyway. I’m looking through my phone logs and at one point I was called four times in one day. They call at night and on the weekends regardless of your repeated requests that they don’t. It’s out of control.

Not the fanciest center, but they get the job done and the location is very convenient. I also like their point system where you earn rewards like gift cards to Starbucks, etc. I do not get any calls requesting an appointment — just an email saying I am eligible to donate now. Nice!
I have never had a problem w/​bruising or multiple sticks at this center. Of course some people are better at it than others.

OK people… giving blood is never a fun experience. It can be uncomfortable, scary, and the nurses are not making nearly enough money to hold your hand and tell you unicorn stories while you are donating (as some of these reviewers seemed to be expecting… lordy!)
But if you meet the donation criteria, you should give blood a few times a year. It doesn’t hurt you, it takes an hour of your time, and you WILL SAVE SOMEONE’S LIFE. Think about that. When was the last time you SAVED SOMEONE’S LIFE? Answer: when you last gave blood (probably, unless you are a paramedic or something).
No, Lifesource does not have the most modern donation center I have ever used — nor is it the worst. It doesn’t matter. Answer that call, make an appointment, KEEP THE APPOINTMENT, and give blood. You will be glad you did.
Just watch it with those celebratory martinis.

Ok, so I’m not a fan of giving blood in general… but it had been a long time since I had. I was really nervous since the last time it was painful and not enough blood came out, I bruised, yadda yadda (wasted my time and blood). It’s been years, so I should do it, right?
Since they were in my building for the day, it was easy to pop downstairs, so yes, I felt I should do it. And they had free cookies — ha ha. They were all nice, and seemed professional… although I am pretty sure my pulse was higher, as it has never been 64 that I can remember! Oh well. The main part is that they were professional, didn’t hurt me, got the needle right the first time, my blood flowed smoothly, I didn’t pass out, and I got oreos and juice :) This was on Wednesday this week.
Now that I read the others that got tons of phone calls, I hope that doesn’t happen to me!

I donated blood at a blood drive today located in a tower in the Loop. I have never interacted with more surly blood bank employees in my life. For the hour that I was there, I heard only about how they were ready to go home and how the turn-​out was higher than they had expected (which sounded a lot like the turnout was higher than they had wanted). Further, when I asked questions about procedure or safety protocol, I was treated as if I was a petulant child. I hadn’t seen a clean tip on the thermometer, and simply asked if the device was clean; my tech rolled her eyes, disposed of the one she had tried to give me, and slurred her way through an explanation of how the machine puts on a new sheath for her automatically (insinuating that I just wasted one of the sheaths with my silly question). Also, when I recommended that they use one arm over another for the blood draw, the tech asked me to wait until a chair for that arm was available. Since all the chairs had just been taken at the same time I was seated, I asked if she couldn’t just move the completely –portable arm support to the other side of the chair. You’d have thought that I had asked her to build a chair from pieces of wood.
After decades of donating blood in other states, this was my first donation in Chicago, and I was not impressed. Not impressed with the procedures, the cleanliness, and certainly not the atmosphere. I will commend the staff, however, on their immediately turning professional when I started to feel faint in the chair — several techs literally ran to my side to take care of me. But other than that, I couldn’t wait to leave.
Also — since this was my first time donating blood in Chicago, I asked my intake tech if LifeSource (a name I was unfamiliar with) was a non-​profit blood bank. She couldn’t tell me for certain. Who doesn’t know if they’re working for a non-​profit or not?

I’ve donated at Lifesource’s blood drive at my YMCA, and also at the downtown location.
The blood drive they ran was great. There were plenty of staff and everybody was friendly. A fellow donor passed out during his donation, and they reacted almost instantly to help him. I was impressed and overall, it was one of my easiest donation experiences.
Donating in the loop was different. There were only two staff members in the donation area itself, and it was all business. Nobody spoke to me, except to ask the federally required health questions. No friendly conversation was reciprocated. They were all about getting people in and out quickly. I don’t really have a problem with this approach, but I think if you are a first time donor, this could make things more intimidating.

It’s a bit hard to get excited about a blood bank, it almost ranks up there with dentists and bus stops in terms of an inherent lack of «yay”-ness.
I’m sorry to hear that some of you had bad experiences with people not finding veins, and scar tissue, etc. That sucks. I have not had any negative experiences here.
Yeah, sure, the place looks old, stuff looks a bit worn out and sad, but the people working here seem friendly, professional, and importantly — they’re cheerful.
For those doing platelet donations, that takes about 90s mins so take your mp3 player or a book — their TVs are tiny and the sound is bad. They will play the DVD of your choice if you wish, but it will sound all crackly.
I wish they had better snacks. But if you like Oreos and those orange peanut butter crackers, you’ll be fine.
My only gripe with today’s donation: I wanted to keep the little red stress ball and i had to give it back. Sniff sniff. I did get a sticker though.

I used to give blood here regularly, like every 3 months or so but have ceased. I travel for work now and am not around enough to make consistent appointments to give. On top of that I’ve developed some noticeable scar tissue on the vein on my right arm and was beginning to look like a smack addict.
Scar tissue aside, I’ve told them about my work situation and to stop calling me 5 times over the phone but I still get called from these people literally 3 to 5 times a day, even on Saturday and Sundays. Luckily my phone has a reject feature so I just see when they call, but it doesn’t ring, just goes straight to voicemail. It’s seriously borderline harassment. Once they have your number, you WILL get called until you make an appointment. I think they’re vampires.
I’m all for giving blood and helping people but getting called everyday until you do so is insane. If you go to Lifesource don’t give them your real contact info unless you know you’ll be able to make regular appointments pretty much for the rest of your life.

We use Lifesource primarily for our blood drives at work.
Apparently if you have had any piercing or tattoo in the last 12 months, Lifesource will not accept any blood donations. The American Red Cross’ website stipulates that if sterile instruments and/​or fresh ink were used, they could accept donations.
I did a little research and found that Senate Bill 927/P.A. 94 – 1040 became law on July 1^st, 2007. It requires the Illinois Department of Public Health to regulate tattoo and body piercing shops (source:
). It also says, «In order to eliminate the risk of virus transmission from donor to recipient, the American Association of Blood Banks requires individuals who get tattoos or piercings from unregulated facilities to wait a year before donating blood.» Blago actually specifically mentioned that this should help increase the number of viable donors, now that people wouldn’t have to wait a year to donate. Well, now that IL regulates tattoo/​piercing shops, what’s the deal with Lifesource not accepting donations from people who have gotten a tattoo/​piercing from a regulated shop? Case in point, I got my nose pierced on August 1^st, 2007, a full month AFTER the law went into effect, at a regulated tattoo shop; today, Lifesource refused my donation based on those grounds.
So will I need to bring a note from my piercer in the future to be able to donate? I’m thinking I should just forget about the Lifesource mobile drives and go to the Red Cross.

I don’t really like this location, but it’s the one closest to my work so I’ve been here a couple of times.
This location isn’t as nice… probably because it’s in the Thompson Center which just kind of generally sucks. I didn’t find the people who work there to be very friendly, but that might just be because I come in towards the end of the day and they want to go home.
They do try to be fast and efficient. The process isn’t that bad. Oh, and giving a pint of blood burns 650 calories (over a span of time) so you don’t even need to feel guilty about having juice and cookies!

I’ve donated with LifeSource previously but at another location so this was my first visit to this location. I made an appointment for 4:45 and was out of there by 5:15. They’ve streamlined the process by having you answer the qualifying questions yourself instead of sitting with someone for 20 mins while they ask you what may be embarrassing questions about your sexual history. There was nobody else there so I sat down immediately and the nurse went right to work. He kept asking me if I was okay or nervous which got to be just a tad annoying because I was fine. No problems with inserting the needle and removing it. The process was quick and painless (15 mins to donate whole blood). Then of course you get all the snacks and juice you want when you are finished. You save 3 lives by donating blood.

So, I believe in giving blood — usually give blood at least 4 – 5 times a year. Well, Lifesource came to my workplace for a blood drive and I donated blood… two months later, they called me and I came here and the lady that treated me wasn’t very professional. She had to restick me three times and then, afterwards, I had a HUGE bruise (I have never bruised from the 20+ times of giving blood and when I mentioned it to her — she was like «Everyone bruises». Next time, I’m going to look for someone else to help me. But it’s a good thing to donate blood :)
edit: I have had to call them to request them to take me off of their calling list — they would call me every week — at least every other day to ask when I could set up my next appointment and I would have to tell them — I’m sorry — I just donated LAST WEEK. it got to the point where it was so irritating — I ended up just going into their office to request my name and number to be removed from their list. I still donate blood but I don’t provide a working number to them anymore.