Donor to Staff Ratio

[Deb]

You any of you have any donor:staff ratios that you attempt to maintain at inhouse sites as well as blood drives?

I had found an older reference that indicated 1.5 donors/staff/hour as a mobile staffing tool.

Just wondered how everyone determines their staffing mix. Please also let me know if the staff are performing whole blood collections only and/or a mix of any other donor center tasks.

Much appreciated.

[dnieves]

Hello Deb,

1.3 to 1.7 is our guidline per the software we use at our blood center.

Ratios below the minimum of 1.3 shows that you may have too much staff assigned, whereas a ratio above 1.7 means your staff will have to work faster, which in turn opens the doors for more errors and poor customer service.

Keep in mind that the actual ratio post drive can tell you a whole lot about a drive. For instance; if your actual turns out to be much higher than what you set out, more than likely your deferal rate will also be very high.

If actual is much lower than your registration should be low as well.

Hope this helps.

[Debbie]

We've had a couple staff to interview (more for a larger sign-up mobile), one collection staff member for every 2 WB donors. Then a volunteer to register, and a volunteer at canteen. There are some staff that can manage 3 donors at a time, but it can get tricky and backfire (and when it gets tricky - as mentioned, errors go up). The key is to have a lead worker/ "float" that can step in and help out with VP or reaction issues so that the 2nd donor doesn't get abandoned altogether.

The above mention of 1.7 staff/ donor sounds about right to me.

[mobea]

Hi

Does anyone have a donor:staff ratio that they use for pheresis platelet collections?

Thanks!

[mtysarczyk]

We are in the process of completing a project to determine units/staff/hr. We anticipate moving to 1.5 for donor centers and routine mobile drives. For high schools, churches and promotional drives we plan on 1.3. I would be interested to know if the staffing ratios listed in the other postings included only the staff that actually interview and collect blood or does it include all assigned to a site/mobile(driver, manager, greeter and interview/phleb staff)?