A grand opening for the Lifesouth Community Blood center on Baymeadows Way is held in July 2018 in Jacksonville. Photo courtesy of Lifesouth
Published on June 24, 2025 at 10:31 am
Free local news and info, in your inbox at 6 a.m. M-F. Sign up for the Jacksonville Today newsletter.
For those on the fence about giving blood, LifeSouth Community Blood Centers is trying to entice donors with a complimentary A1c test so they can learn if they may have diabetes.
LifeSouth is a nonprofit community blood center that provides blood products to over 125 hospitals in Florida, Georgia and Alabama, with a mission to secure a safe and reliable blood supply for patients in need.
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
LifeSouth supplies blood to 70% of Northeast Florida hospital beds.
The free A1c tests LifeSouth is administering this summer measure average blood sugar levels going back three months, and alert people to their diabetes risk.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in three adults has pre-diabetes, and the majority don’t even know it.
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
LifeSouth Vice President of Medical Services Dr. Chris Lough says by offering health tests, the organization is trying to give back to blood donors.
“Offering hemoglobin A1c testing to all blood donors gives us a chance to help our communities take charge of their health and learn if they are at risk for prediabetes and diabetes,” Lough told Jacksonville Today.
“If you’ve donated before, you know, we’ve done cholesterol for a very long time for people to monitor that, so this was kind of a next step, something similar that’s a large chronic health problem in the U.S. that we can help folks identify if they’re at risk for it,” Lough said.
He says patients will get the A1c results back in about a week. Discussing the findings with a primary care provider can help mitigate serious health complications such as heart disease, kidney failure and vision loss.
In addition to A1c testing, all blood donors receive a “mini physical” including cholesterol screen, blood pressure, pulse, hemoglobin level and temperature. Each donor has a donor portal where they can get all their information and monitor hemoglobin and other health markers.
According to Lough, every blood donation can save three lives and LifeSouth is always in need of blood products, trying to recruit new donors, which is why the nonprofit is following the initiatives of other blood centers to offer health tests.
“We had Stanford Blood Center out in California implement it right about the same time we were actually performing the testing for Gulf Coast in Texas so we brought it on for them first and now we’re bringing it to our donors here,” he said.
Blood donated with LifeSouth directly helps area patients at: Baptist Medical Centers, Wolfson Children’s Hospital, HCA Florida Hospitals in Jacksonville and Orange Park, and UF Health Jacksonville and UF Health North.
To find a blood drive or donor center, visit lifesouth.org.
