New towns announced for WA Pop-up donor centre trial

Residents in Busselton, Armadale, and Cockburn will soon be able to donate blood close to home.

Australian Red Cross Lifeblood has today announced that a further three towns have been added to the WA pop-up donor centre trial schedule, which is on track to start collecting blood in the second half of 2024. 

Busselton, Armadale, and Cockburn join the Western Australian regional communities of Kalgoorlie and Geraldton, which were the first two towns confirmed when Lifeblood announced the WA pop-up donor centre trial late last year. 

Lifeblood Executive Director of Donor Experience Cath Stone said they were thrilled to be planning visits to Busselton, Armadale, and Cockburn in the coming months.

“For the past six months we’ve had a dedicated team conducting extensive research and analysis to identify suitable locations for the pop-up and working through operational logistics,” she said.

“We know these three communities will be very excited to be able to donate closer to home, and we’re confident there are enough potential donors in these locations to make the pop-up visits successful.

“We’re particularly excited to be adding another regional town in Busselton to the list, as one of the benefits of a pop-up donor centre is it enables us to provide more donation options for regional communities.”

Pop-up donor centres are mobile donor centres that operate from a local venue, such as a community hall, and are set-up and packed down for each visit.

The location of pop-up visits is based on several factors including proximity to our processing centres, population size, estimated donation rate, suitable venue availability, access to regional communities, and availability of qualified staff.

Ms Stone said Lifeblood was still in the process of finalising more sites for the pop-up trial.

“We’re currently working through venue logistics for a number of other sites, as well as licensing regulations for all our sites,” she said.

“We hope to be able to share the locations of the remaining sites, as well as start dates for the pop-up very soon. We’re confident the pop-up will be up and running this spring.” 

With demand for blood continuing to increase, the new WA pop-up will help increase donations across the country and is planned to collect around 40 blood donations a day.

Once established, the pop-up will operate in WA for an initial trial period of 12 months. At the end of the trial, Lifeblood will review how well appointments have been filled.

All blood donations made at the WA pop-up will be sent to Perth for testing and processing before being distributed to hospitals around the country as needed.