Dr. Guy Hadden With CSL Plasma

Intro: [00:00:03] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Richmond, Virginia. It’s time for Richmond Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:15] Lee Kantor are here, another episode of Richmond Business Radio and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor War Cry Consulting Solutions, supporting women to lean into their purpose, craft their vision and crush their goals. Today on Richmond Business Radio, we have Dr. Guy Hadden with CSL Plasma. Welcome.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:00:40] Thank you, sir. Appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:42] Well, I’m excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about CSL plasma. How are you serving folks?

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:00:48] CSL plasma is a biopharmaceutical company is what we are. The plasma portion that I’m affiliated with is a division within the larger parent group. We’ve been collecting human plasma for the manufacture of different serums and therapies for treating just a variety of diseases, mostly rare diseases, but nonetheless diseases with for thousands and thousands of people around the world.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:22] So is donating plasma the same as donating blood?

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:01:27] Sort of. When you go in and you donate blood, they take the whole blood from you. That part is the same here. Where it differs is when you donate whole blood, they’ll take a pint or a liter of blood from you and then they’ll keep that entire amount of blood. And then you can’t donate again for another 56 to 60 days because it takes that long for your body to regenerate it. In the plasma process, we take the whole blood just like, say, the Red Cross would, and we run it through a centrifuge or a four rhesus machine. We separate the blood from the plasma. When I say blood, I should say we separate the red blood cells, the white blood cells and the platelets, because those three items and the fourth item being plasma is what comprise comprises all of the blood that’s in your body. All right. And so what we do is we separate the plasma from those other elements. We give those elements back to the donor IV group, goes right back into the donor, and we only keep the plasma throughout this process. You can actually donate two times a week. You can donate as long as there’s a day in between. So if you donate it on Monday, you can donate again on Wednesday and you can donate up to the two times in a seven day period.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:57] And that’s because you’re putting the less the plasma, everything else is going back into the donor.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:03:04] That that is correct. We also supplement with just normal saline. So you’ll get that upon leaving or finishing your your donation procedure. So, I mean, technically, when you walk out of the building, you’re walking out of the building with the exact same of volume of fluid that you walk into the building with. So and then within 24 to 48 hours, your body is going to replenish every bit of that plasma that was extracted.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:36] And then so a donor could do this more often. And then you’re getting that needed plasma more frequently.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:03:44] Absolutely. A donor can donate up to two times every seven days year round.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:51] And then is the experience from the donor side pretty similar other than the kind of getting the IV back and getting the fluids back into them.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:04:03] Yeah, it’s the you know, if you’ve ever given blood, then the experience is virtually the same. The the cells and everything that are going back into the body are not going in through a different tube like a second needle, any of that kind of stuff. It’s going through the same process. And so through the same tube, the same needle, you only get stuck once and the whole process will actually take a little bit longer than it would for you to donate blood. You could probably donate blood in anywhere from 15 minutes to 30 minutes. It really depends upon how hydrated you are. The process here is going to take you anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour, depending upon the how hydrated you are and whether or not you’re really prepared to donate.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:58] And that’s an important thing also. So if somebody is interested in donating, how would they go about being kind of optimally prepared.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:05:08] As far as as far as the the donation process, being prepared really means nothing more than being properly hydrated, you know, eating, eating a decent, well-balanced meal. Obviously, if you eat it in the morning and you come in the afternoon, that meal isn’t going to help you because that meal hasn’t even been absorbed through your body. So it’s one of those things that, you know, for a day or two prior to donating, you know, if you’re eating a decent meal, you’re keeping fully hydrated, then the process goes smooth, it’s fast and you know, you’re in and out of here within an hour to an hour and a half.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:53] And then why should someone consider doing this instead of or in conjunction with donating blood?

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:06:05] Well, I mean, that’s a great question, and I don’t want to talk to anybody out of donating blood because blood is very much needed as well. Our parent company, which is CSL Behring, and they use the human plasma that we’re collecting and they use it to produce different therapies and pharmaceuticals to treat numerous diseases, you know, that are all around the globe. All right. We we provide these different medications in over 100 countries around the planet. The therapies are different types of bleeding disorders, such as hemophilia, von willebrand’s, disease, primary immune deficiencies, head, a hereditary angioedema, respiratory disease, neurological disorders, autoimmune diseases. Plasma is also used in cardiac surgery, organ transplantation, burn treatments, cancer treatments used in trauma. And then it’s also one of the big things is to prevent hemolytic disease in newborn babies. So the need is there and. The majority of these diseases. It doesn’t necessarily cure the disease, but it provides a much better quality of life for these patients around the world. I’ve spoke with I can’t tell you how many how many different patients that I’ve spoke with or people that are that are actually using these different types of of drugs and therapies to allow them to do the things that you and I normally do and we don’t even think about and don’t don’t consider. So that’s why it’s such an important. Important topic and issue and that we really push for and try to help.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:08:09] Unfortunately, to one person that has, say, von Willebrand’s disease, all right, that one person requires up to 1200 donations of plasma just for that one person per year. So, you know, I mean, it’s we can’t make enough of it. All right. Let me rephrase that. The body makes it, but we can’t store enough of it to treat everybody who actually needs the product. And so that’s why there’s just such a push right now to to help as many people as we can. And of course, coming out of COVID, you know, there was a lot of people with the lockdowns and everything that the donations slowed way down and but the need for the product didn’t. And so that’s kind of where we are now, where it’s just created a a supply issue, much like groceries and everything else. And probably the biggest thing between donating blood and donating plasma is when you donate plasma, you have that knowledge that you’re helping somebody. But you’re also getting paid for it. So that’s a nice little perk that and that’s why we say that, you know, it’s it’s good for the great for the individual and good for you because, you know, they get the medication they need and then, you know, you get paid for your time to come and do it.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:46] Now, for folks who are suffering from one one of those diseases, are they typically the first move is to go to family members? I would imagine that’s the first thing that the family reaches out to everybody and say, hey, this is important. Let’s all do this for the sake of, you know, our niece or our cousin or whatever. But like you said, this is something that the general population should be thinking about in order to just do good for others. But also you can get paid. So it’s kind of a win win win all the way around.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:10:18] Absolutely. And to be honest with you, that’s what really got me into this in the first place is because of my own daughter. You know, she’s got an autoimmune disorder. I don’t know where it came from. Does it run in the family? But it’s just one of those things that out of the blue she ended up with it. And she’s currently taking some of the medications that that I personally don’t make because I’m on the plasma side. But our company makes and let me tell you, it’s a world of difference between before she started and where she is now. I mean, it’s not going to remove that condition from her. She’s going to have that till she dies, but at least she acts and feels like she did before, before the whole thing happened. So, yeah, absolutely. And when anything hits close to you, you know, it becomes bigger. You know? I mean, it’s crazy that I would venture to say that most people, if you talk to them about plasma, you know, and donating plasma, they really don’t even know what you’re talking about. I mean, this is not one of these these things that have been widely publicized, publicized like donating blood. So that thought really just isn’t automatically their right.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:38] It’s not top of mind, but the need is there. I mean.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:11:42] Absolutely. Absolutely.

Lee Kantor: [00:11:44] So if somebody wants to learn more about this, find to see if there’s a place for them to donate, what is the website? What’s the best way to go about getting involved?

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:11:57] The easiest way to do is just I mean, if you have access to a computer or a phone, just go to CSL and that’s really all you have to put in a CSL if you want. You can put CSL plasma, which is our specific department of CSL. But either way I’ll get you to it right there on that website. There’s a spot in there, you know that you can see all of the different centers. We have over 300 centers in the United States, we have over 900 centers around around the globe. You can pick a state, a city and all of the places within that geographical area and get addresses, phone numbers and everything to that particular CSL. There’s even a link on there. You know, for careers, if you’re looking for a job, you know, if you want to be within this industry, you know, and the jobs are listed the exact same way, so you can do it by state by city and, and just kind of go through right here in the Richmond area. We’ve got two two centers, one in Henrico and one in Richmond, and then we’ve got one down in Norfolk. So if you’re in the Richmond area, we’ve got one one within an easy driving distance to you.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:15] And like you said, you know, if you want to do this, to do to do good, sure do that. But if you want to do it to earn some extra money, I’m on the website right now. It says you can earn up to $1,000 in your first month.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:13:30] Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, and every month you see once you once you become a new donor. All right. Basically your first eight donations is what’s considered a new donor. All right. So you can make anywhere from 800 clear up to 1200. All of the centers have different promotions going on each month. Then once you become a qualified donor, then obviously those those numbers drop a little bit. But you go from making $800 in your first month to making five or $600 in your second month. And virtually you can do that year round. So I mean, I have a lot of donors that come in and they basically treat this as a second job. You know, I mean, it’s a couple of hours of your time, you know, two times a week. And you make five, $600 a month. I mean, it’s pretty hard to beat.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:30] Yeah. One more time. The website I was on CECL plasma dot com. That’s where I found this information. Is that kind of a clearinghouse for this?

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:14:39] So that one more time I’m sorry.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:41] I was at CECL plasma dot com. The letter C, the letter S the letter L plasma plasma.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:14:50] That is correct, yes.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:53] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Dr. Guy Hadden: [00:14:59] Well, thank you, sir. I appreciate the opportunity to be here and even talk about it.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:03] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see y’all next time on Richmond Business Radio.