triciac

Thank you for the great information-very generous of you to share!

These are really difficult decisions to make. I began my BSN program when my son was three-he will be seven when I graduate in December. Although it wasn't an accelerated program, it was very competitive and time consuming, especially for a single mom. Here are a few things I have learned along the way. Focus on the positive-you are showing your children that it's important to have goals and follow through. Even if you think their too young to understand, you'd be surprised what they are learning from you. They see that homework is important and will celebrate with you when you do well. They will see that hard work pays off. They will see that you finished what you started, even when it wasn't easy. You will be teaching them by example. Good luck with whatever you decide.

42 when I began, will graduate at 46.

Conroe Regional Medical Center is about 40 miles north of Houston (appx. 15 miles N of Spring). It's a fairly large hospital with a trama center/hyperbaric dept/cancer center...plus your traveling in the opposite direction of all the traffic. Another plus is The Woodlands school system-it's excellent. Good luck on your job search.

Here is some information I found on the AABB website (http://www.aabb.org) Preoperative Donation The most common autologous donation is the preoperative donation of blood for possible transfusion back to the donor during elective surgery. For example, a person might give one unit of blood each week for up to six weeks before surgery, because blood can be stored in its liquid form for up to 42 days. Patients can make autologous donations up until 72 hours prior to their surgery. This is to allow the body enough time to replenish its blood supply before the surgical procedure. A significant amount of iron is removed with each autologous donation. When appropriate, iron supplements are prescribed for patients making autologous donations in order to help increase red blood cell count. Autologous donation is most often employed in surgery on bones, blood vessels, the urinary tract, and the heart, when the likelihood of transfusion is high. According to the National Blood Data Resource Center, autologous blood accounted for 4.7 percent of all donated blood in 1999. Potential autologous blood donors are medically stable patients who are free of infection. There is no age limitation for autologous donation. Many children and elderly patients have successfully completed autologous donations; however, some patients may not be good candidates. The physician and patient should make the decision regarding autologous donation and transfusion jointly. The process of donating autologous blood stimulates the bone marrow to produce new blood cells. Given adequate time for recovery, the collected cells may be wholly or partially replaced prior to surgery. If blood loss during surgery is less than anticipated, transfusion of autologous blood may not be medically necessary. Although the risk of a complication from autologous blood is low, some residual risk persists, making automatic transfusion of autologous units unwise. Forty-four percent of autologous donations are unused by the autologous donor. These units generally are discarded because current standards do not allow transfusion of these units to another patient for safety reasons. In emergency situations, however, these units may be used for another patient provided there is medical approval for the crossover and the unit has been fully screened. Due to the special handling and separate storage requirements, autologous donations cost more to process. Hope it helps