GRAND RAPIDS, MB — Traditionally, donated blood is separated into red cells, plasma, and platelets. But trauma patients often need all of it — fast.

That’s why Corewell Health Aero Med is now carrying whole blood on board, one of the first pre-hospital programs of its kind in Michigan.

Dr. Aaron Ziegler, Medical Director at Aero Med, said that instead of separating donations, crews can now deliver all the components patients need immediately.

“Now when somebody donates a unit of blood, they leave it whole, and so we have all of those components that we can give on the side of the road, in the back of an ambulance, in the back of the helicopter, to help save their life when they have life-threatening bleeding," Dr. Ziegler says.

Ziegler says studies show the faster patients receive bloo

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