Ján Žyla, a blood donation record holder, works for OKD

ORLOVÁ – At parties and feasts, Ján Žyla (53), a mine electrician from the Lazy Mine, prefers drinking a high-quality apple brandy (i.e., calvados). However, he drinks calvados in moderation because he is aware of its potential effects on the human body. Apart from performing a responsible job position in the Karviná Mine, he is also a blood and plasma donor. No one in the whole Czech Republic and most likely in the whole Europe has undergone so many blood takings as him!

“However, nowhere is it written that on New Year's Eve I will drink only water or coffee with my family or friends. If possible, I will not hobble myself,” he said and added that in 2011 he would visit the transfusion station in the Karviná-Ráj Hospital for the 500^th time. Since he was 18 years old, he has made 487 such visits, and he expects to make the jubilee and record-breaking one in late spring or early summer.

“I must not drink any alcohol or eat fat food at least sixteen hours before the blood taking. Therefore, I can still celebrate since in the first week of January, I will not visit the transfusion station. And as for my work, I have been working only on the afternoon shift for eight years already,” said the electrician from Pavel Letoch’s working party. He graduated from the Apprentice Centre to start working in the Lazy Mine, where his father and uncle also used to work. He took up employment there in 1975.

“Old miners who were donating blood started to make fun of me saying that I would not stand it. The decision to donate blood was thus based on teasing and curiosity,” he specified adding that after the first forty blood takings he started to donate plasma. And with the number of visits to the transfusion station, the number of medals, certificates of merit and bronze, silver and gold plaques of the Czech Red Cross was increasing.

“Last time I donated blood before Christmas. It is possible to say that I donated someone my plasma as a Christmas present. One never knows what may happen to him and when he himself may need help. I also realized it during my backbone operation in hospital,” stated Žyla, who has never met any recipient of his blood or plasma. Considering his “donation” frequency, it is possible to suppose that such a recipient may also have been one of his colleagues from the mine or OKD.

Radek Lukša