This Pueblo man has donated 90 gallons of blood, leads Southern Colorado in donations

There are about 1.2 to 1.5 gallons of blood in a human body, according to the American Red Cross.

A Pueblo man has donated 90 gallons since 1985, or about 60 times his own blood supply. He's the first to do so in Southern Colorado, according to Vitalant, the nation’s largest independent, nonprofit organization providing life-saving blood services.

Mihalick calculates that over the last four decades, he has donated blood or platelets more than 720 times. Mihalick's first donation was at St. Mary Corwin Hospital in Pueblo.

"I was working for a company, and one of my coworkers said they needed someone to replace blood for her because she was having surgery," Mihalick recalled. "So I went down to St. Mary Corwin and donated then, and they said, 'Hey, do you want to come back next week?'"

"Once you start doing a thing, 40 years and you keep doing it and doing it, it gets to be a habit, and you can't break away from it. I enjoy it, and most importantly, the people really need the platelets," he said.

"There's such a need, for people who are cancer victims, for leukemia victims, they absolutely need it," Mihalick said.

Mihalick was originally donating whole blood but started donating platelets in 1991. At some point, platelet donations were "cut off" in Pueblo, so Mihalick started driving with his wife to Highlands Ranch in the southern Denver metro area.

"Finally, after a while, the Colorado Springs office opened about 10 years ago, so I was able to just start going up to the Springs office to donate, instead of doing the long drive up to Highlands Ranch," he said. "(Going all the way to Highlands Ranch) was a chore, I have to thank my wife for all the help for those years, I think I would have burned out, but she came along and drove with me, so it was a big help all those years."

While it's often easy to forget, donating blood does make a tangible difference, Mihalick said.

"You do it and you think the blood goes off to neverland, you don't think about it, but about four or five years ago, a guy came up to me and he said, 'I want to thank you. I'm not allowed to donate blood. If it weren't for guys like you donating platelets, my brother wouldn't be alive,'" Mihalick recalled.

The man explained that his brother had leukemia and required platelets two to three times a month.

"When you donate blood, you really are saving lives," he said.

In fact, for every pint of blood donated, three lives can be saved so Mihalick has saved as many as 2,160 lives over the years.

There are several steps to every session

"First of all, you check in, then you go through a checklist — they check your blood pressure, they check your pulse, your temperature, and they check a bunch of significant factors on you to see if you qualify. Then you go through a 45-50 minute questionnaire about your habits and things you've gone through the last six months," he explained.

"Then they hook you up to a machine — it's usually about 20 minutes, they draw the blood from you and it goes into the machine. The machine processes it, takes out the platelets and returns the blood to you in the same needle," Mihalick said.

The entire process of donating platelets takes about 90 minutes to two hours, he said, although donating whole blood may take less than half an hour.

The process is somewhat draining, he said.

"It tires you out a little bit, plus there's the hour drive back from Colorado Springs. I get out at around 8:15 in the morning and don't get back until 12:30, or 1, you're kind of pooped by the end of the day. I drink a lot of water to replace the fluids," he said.

However, he still encourages people to give blood.

"I try to get people to do that, in my own family, one of my daughters is a pretty good donor," he said. "It's hard for people who are working, the process takes so long, but at the worst, they should get down and give whole blood."

"It keeps your community members going and it costs you nothing," he said.

Along with being the highest donor in Southern Colorado, Mihalick says he is not far behind the title of highest donor statewide.

"I was just talking to a gal from the Vitalant center, I was asking who the highest donors were," he said. "And they realized that the highest donor in Colorado right now, four or five guys ahead of me, is only at 92 (gallons). Of course, those guys still continue to donate, but I'm close."

Blood donation is a critical need

In a news release, Vitalant addressed the critical needs of patients in the country. "Donors of all blood types are crucial, especially type O as O-negative blood can help patients regardless of blood type and is what emergency room doctors reach for when there isn’t time to blood type a patient," the blood bank wrote.

All donors who donate with Vitalant in May are automatically entered into the “Vacay Giveaway” to win one of three, $5,000 prepaid gift cards, Vitalant said. Donors from May 26-June 1 will also receive a special thank-you T-shirt for helping ensure an adequate blood supply around the Memorial Day holiday weekend when donations tend to drop. All promotions and giveaways are redeemable by email.

To donate blood in Pueblo, Vitalant has regularly-occurring blood drives and donors can visit donors.vitalant.org and enter “Pueblo” into the zip code area to find all of the upcoming events. Blood donations also are taken at LFB Plasma at 3020 Hart Road and GrifolsTalecris Plasma Resources Pueblo at 1501 Moore Ave.

More blood donation news: Blood supply shortage triggers emergency; here's how you can help in Pueblo

Questions, comments, or story tips? Contact Justin at jreutterma@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @jreutterma@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on The Pueblo Chieftain: Pueblo man gives 90 gallons of blood, leads Southern Colorado donations