In cooperation between our Vocational School and the Turkish Red Crescent, on Wednesday, 9 October 2024, at the Şehit Ömer Halisdemir Conference Hall, the “Blood and Stem Cell Donation Awareness Training” event was held.

Prof. Dr. Aytaç GÜDER, Director of the Vocational School of Health Services, who delivered the opening speech of the event, emphasised that gaining awareness regarding blood and stem cell donation is extremely important and concluded the speech by saying, “As the Vocational School of Health Services, we are a school that touches every segment of society. With our various departments, we have become one big SHMYO family. I thank all our academics and students who contributed to the event. In hospitals there are mothers and fathers, sons and daughters who have been waiting for days, weeks, months for a transplant for themselves or for a relative. Or there are people who have been left all alone, with no one. By donating blood and stem cells, you can become the heroes of these people. Do not forget, friends: you are not helpless, you are the remedy.”

Our Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Emel UZUNUOĞLU, in turn, said in a speech, “I am pleased to be at such an important event. As a physician working in the field of Medical Microbiology, I attach great importance to blood and stem cell donation. I thank our SHMYO academics who made such an event possible and our students who contributed.”

Adem Buğdaylı, Eastern Black Sea Stem Cell Donor Recruitment Specialist of the Turkish Red Crescent, described in the presentation the work they carry out in blood donation and stem cell donor recruitment. Buğdaylı, who explained the processes relating to blood and stem cell donation in detail, said, “With the TÜRKÖK Project implemented by the Turkish Red Crescent, there are today 16 stem cell donor centres in Türkiye. We have been a member of the World Bone Marrow Bank since 2016. The cells used in stem cell donation are essentially special cells that are functionally differentiated, capable of self-renewal, able to proliferate, and have the capacity to differentiate into different cells. With stem cell transplantation, the treatment of bone marrow cancers, lymphomas, various organ cancers, conditions in which the bone marrow functions inadequately or does not function, hereditary anaemias, immune deficiencies and hereditary metabolic diseases becomes possible. You too can become blood and stem cell donors and touch people's lives. I invite all our students to the blood and stem cell donation areas we have set up at Güre Campus.”

The event ended following the presentation of the certificate of appreciation.

We congratulate those who contributed to the organisation of the event, first and foremost Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sevim Çiftçi YEGİN, Head of the Department of Health Care Services of our Vocational School, and the Turkish Red Crescent representatives, and we thank all our academic and administrative staff and the participants.

At the end of the event, the participants showed great interest in the Turkish Red Crescent Blood Donation vehicle set up in front of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences Building, and it was stated that 66 units of blood and 15 stem cell donations were made.