Finland

The Finnish Red Cross Blood Service is the nationwide blood service provider in Finland.
Our services comprise recruiting blood donors, organising blood donation, collecting blood and testing the donated blood. We use the donated blood to make cellular blood products which we then deliver to hospitals for use in treating patients. We also operate a Stem Cell Registry.
A highly professional and effective organisation, excellent donor relations and co-operation with health-care staff and regulatory authorities ensures the success in achieving our goals. Together we create potential to enhance patients’ quality of life and to save lives.
The Blood Service provides Finnish hospitals with various blood products for treating patients. We also offer hospitals laboratory services, such as blood group testing and investigations related to organ transplantation and blood coagulation. Other laboratory testing carried out by the Blood Service include, for instance, blood group antibody screening of all pregnant women in Finland.
Our specialist staff provides consultation for doctors and other health-care professionals. As an important aspect of haemovigilance, i.e. surveillance of the safety of the entire transfusion chain, we collect data of transfusion-related adverse effects.
The Blood Service employs some 500 people. Most of the staff work at the Helsinki Blood Centre in Kivihaka, which also houses many functions of the Blood Service, such as laboratory services, quality control and support operations. The donor centres of the Blood Service employ approximately nearly a hundred people at 10 locations.
In addition to donor centres, blood can be donated at sessions run by mobile blood collection units. Such sessions are arranged even twice a month, in almost every town and rural district in Finland, as well as in many workplaces, educational institutions and military garrisons.
Finnish Red Cross Blood Service performs active scientific research by which we want to increase biomedical knowledge on our areas of expertise. This can be achieved primarily by scientific publications and academic dissertations. The scientific research also creates the foundation for R&D projects in which we develop our products and services. We also  run a biobank, which collects blood samples and information from blood donors.  The Blood Service Biobank focuses on the research of blood donors’ health and wellbeing. In addition, the collected samples can be used in medical research for example as a control group.
The Blood Service is a part of the Finnish Red Cross. We are a not-for-profit organisation, and our prime concern is what is best for the patient. The income from selling hospitals the products and services we provide are used to cover the operating expenses and investments. Our net sales amount annually to about 60 million euros. More information about the economy is in our annual report.