What Does The Spinning Centrifuge Measure When Donating Blood?
After pricking your finger and putting the blood in that spinning centrifuge thing, what is that actually measuring? The lady that took my blood wrote down 45% but what does that number mean?
45% is the % of your blood that is red blood cells. The rest would be mostly plasma. It is also called hematocrit. If your hematocrit is below a certain level, they will not allow you to donate blood because your red blood cells are too few.
hematocrit. its the volume of your red cells in relation to your whole blood. you should not have too little or too much red cells to be able to qualify for a donation.