Date Visited : September 24, 2008 State Number: 17

Contact Information: Mississippi Valley Regional Blood Center 11853 Dorsett Road Maryland Heights, Missouri 63043 Patrick Fenton Phone: 314-291-4741   Email: pfenton@mvrbc.com Web Site: www.bloodcenter.org

Some people dream of spending their retirements on the golf course, traveling the world or drinking piña coladas on a beach. Not Al Whitney.

Whitney , 71, from Ohio, is on a two-year quest to donate blood platelets in every state. On Wednesday he visited the Mississippi Valley Regional Blood Center in Crestwood to notch his 16th state visit since starting in fall 2007. He donated in Glenview, Ill., last December.

Since he started donating his blood products in the 1960s, Whitney has poured out 614 units of platelets and five gallons of blood.

He's inspired by "just the idea that I'm saving somebody's life. I'll never know who they are, and that's not important."

Platelets are a part of the blood that helps with clotting. The donations are typically used in transfusions for organ transplant, cancer and burn patients.

Donating platelets involves apheresis, a process by which blood is removed and the platelets are separated by an attached spinning machine. The leftover blood is then returned to the patient. Eligible donors can undergo the 90-minute procedure as many as 24 times in a year.

Whitney, a retired maintenance supervisor, came up with the idea of traveling to every state during a regular donation near his home near Cleveland, when he felt the need to do more.

Whitney uses his own savings to fund the trips and said he was too scared to keep track of what he has spent. When he's in a new city, Whitney talks to church and community groups about the need for blood platelets. He isn't paid for his donations or for his travel, but local blood centers typically pay for a night's hotel stay.

Because he can donate platelets only every two weeks, Whitney returns home between stops. Then he shops around for airfare sales to pick where he goes next before contacting a donation center in that area.

Whitney said his wife, Nancy, stayed home because "they're working trips, they're not sightseeing."

Gary Jones, a site supervisor at the Crestwood donation center, said dedicated donors such as Whitney were vital to keeping blood products available for patients. Blood donations typically spike after natural and man-made disasters, but "there are plenty of little disasters happening every day in hospitals," he said.

As for Whitney, surely he plans to relax once the platelet tour is over, right?

Wrong, he said.

"Once I've completed all 50 states I'm starting over."