A Recipient Story: Mike

“I am in the hospital now. I have been there since last Wednesday,” says Mike Kirtz in 2023.
“I have acute myeloid leukemia.” Mike was at Mayo Clinic Hospital — Rochester, Methodist Campus, where he was undergoing his second cycle of treatment. “In my first cycle of treatment, I had something like four or five units of blood and a couple of units of platelets. This cycle, I have not received any blood or platelets. My blood counts have not gone down low enough to where I will need one.”

Mike started off the year healthy. He was even a blood donor. “I last donated in February sometime,” recounts Mike. “It makes me really glad that I took the time to donate when I did. It makes me wish I would have done it more often though.” Because as the year went on, his health seemed to be just a bit off. Initially, doctors attributed Mike’s growing number of aches and pains to aging. It wasn’t until he went in with a swollen knee that tests showed low blood counts, which eventually led to his diagnosis.

“Blood donation is something that is needed all of the time,” says Mike. “I had never received a unit of blood before this. How many units of blood is my next treatment going to take? I don’t know, and I am just one story. Blood donation is such a constant need.”

Mike is currently in remission and working his way toward complete remission, but because of the diagnosis of a bloodborne cancer, he will no longer be eligible to donate blood. Still, in the wake of his diagnosis, Mike’s loved ones have come in to donate because of him as a way to show their love and support.