Who can donate platelets?
Several criteria must be met by donors. Browse through them to check your eligibility.
Understanding platelets donation
Réalité : Whether or not you live in Quebec is not in itself a criterion for Héma-Québec to exclude you from donating platelets. However, some stays abroad can make you temporarily or permanently ineligible to donate platelets. For more information, visit the Travelling and living abroad page to see the eligibility criteria for platelets donation.
Reality: Héma-Québec regularly reviews its platelet donation eligibility criteria based on the latest scientific research. For instance, potential donors who had previously been excluded from blood product donation for geographic risk factors related to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) are eligible to donate platelets since december 2023.
Several eligibility criteria entail only temporary ineligibility to donate platelets. For more information, visit the Travelling and living abroad page to see the eligibility criteria for platelets donation.
Reality: The safety of donors and recipients is a priority at Héma-Québec. That is why it establishes qualification criteria. These criteria are reviewed and assessed on a regular basis. everal eligibility criteria entail only temporary ineligibility to donate platelets (such as tattoos). For more information, visit the Beauty and personal care page to see the eligibility criteria for platelets donation.
Recent changes to our eligibility criteria
Héma-Québec regularly reviews its blood, plasma and platelet donation eligibility criteria based on the latest scientific research. That means that people who were ineligible in the past may now be eligible to donate.
Lifting criteria for “mad cow disease”
Potential donors who had previously been excluded from blood product donation for geographic risk factors related to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) are now eligible to donate.
Relaxing criteria for diabetes
This change means that more people living with diabetes are now eligible to donate blood products. The criteria are easier to apply at blood drives and are better at identifying the risks for blood product donors and recipients.
Removing criteria for men who have sex with men (MSM) and implementing a gender-neutral questionnaire for blood product donation
All potential donors now respond to the same questions—no matter their sex, gender or sexual orientation—and must indicate if they’ve had sex with one or more new partners in the past three months.
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