06 | March | 2025 | Plaid Line + PRIZM + Scottie News

By: Kate Tabor

We all love music, and it turns out that it’s for a good reason. Many studies have shown that music can have a positive impact on your mental health (and even your physical health, if only by a bit). Here’s how.

Music helps distract us from our thoughts and lowers our stress. Listening to music can lower stress hormones, as well as blood sugar and heart rate, both of which are things that spike when you’re stressed. If you want to block out the world and forget about whatever problems you’re dealing with at the moment, listening to songs that share a different story is a good way to do that.

Not only can it help with stress, it can help you name your emotions, and manage them better. If you’re feeling off, but don’t know why, try listening to classical music. It sounds silly, but hearing a melody without lyrics helps you project your own feelings onto the music, without the music already having a feeling or meaning.

Even without classical music, songs can often help us figure out what we’re feeling as well. I can’t count how many times I turn on one of my favorite songs casually, and even though I’ve heard it a million times before, a lyric sticks out to me and I just think wow, where are the cameras hidden? Music can help you place your feelings, and also feel seen in those feelings.

Music builds community. It brings people together. Music festivals, radio shows, Spotify playlists, etc. A popular app around my age group a bit ago was an app called Airbuds Widget, where you can share what you’re listening to with your friends. I’ve made so many friends based on just recognizing that we both listen to the same artist.

Music can also boost your mood when you’re feeling down, which I find to be especially true. Everyday, I hop in my car after school and turn my favorite playlist on, and I immediately feel better.

Even just half an hour ago, I was unmotivated to start writing this article, but I sat down, put my airpods in, and got to work. Music has a huge impact on me, and I’m sure many others, on how motivated I feel.

Music can be a great tool, even when we don’t realize it.

For more information, please visit:

https://jedfoundation.org/resource/how-music-can-improve-your-mental-health/

By: Maya Vossen-Nelson

Nearly 6.8 million people donate blood per year in the United States, providing vital resources and support to cancer patients, surgeries, accident and burn victims, and organ transplant patients. In July 2024, the American Red Cross reported a record low in donor participation dropping by 25%. This shortage began during a nationwide heat wave over the summer and donor numbers have not returned to their normal levels since.

Recently, factors such as climate disasters have increased the demand for blood units and the drop in donations are unable to replace the inventory. Blood centers are reporting that limited donor sites, loss of staffing at blood centers, new illness and medication constraints for donation eligibility, along with a decrease in workplace donation events since the rise of remote working have all contributed to lower donor numbers.

Blood shortages are a pressing symptom of the overburdened, under-resourced healthcare system. As of March 4, 2025, of the 53 community blood centers and 90 hospital based blood centers in the United States, 46% have less than a two-day supply of blood.

Amid these unresolved blood shortages, surgeons have turned to blood supply usage efficiency as a method of mitigating the lower supply consequences. Adoption of Patient Blood Management (PBM) policies currently include using preoperative strategies to increase red cell mass, intraoperative cell salvage, and the management of anemia in patients.

To most patients, this medical jargon carries little meaning, overshadowing its influence in medicine. The Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies (AABB) describes the importance of, and medical situations where, PBM is used: “PBM encompasses all aspects of the transfusion decision-making process, beginning with the initial patient evaluation and continuing through clinical management. These techniques are designed to ensure optimal patient outcomes, while maintaining the blood supply to guarantee that blood components are available for patients when they are needed.”

Preoperative strategies to increase red cell mass include pre-op testing 3 to 4 weeks in advance of the surgery to undergo blood testing and receive proper supplements or medication to resolve anemia.

On average, patients with anemia require an additional liter of blood during surgeries and require longer hospital stays compared to their counterparts. Given that 22.8% of people worldwide are anemic, resolving anemia even temporarily for a surgery would significantly decrease pressure on blood centers.

Intraoperative cell salvage (ICS) is a method used during surgery to collect red blood cells lost during surgery and reintegrating them into the body. Before the blood transfusion, the red cells are processed and repaired. This blood management method requires no additional blood.

These strategies have increased the ability for blood centers to cope with the blood shortages, but the ultimate fix is recruiting more donors. Of the 37% of eligible donors, only 3% choose to donate. Your donation is more important than ever. To schedule a blood donation with the American Red Cross visit: https://www.redcrossblood.org and select from countless donor drives near you.

For more information, please visit: