Questions remain in Maine Blood Center closing
After more than eight years, the Maine Blood Center in Bangor has shuttered its doors, effectively eliminating a dozen jobs, the apparent result of softening demand for some of its blood products.
The center, operated by California-based HemaCare and located on Union Street, abruptly closed in late August, surprising both those who had worked and donated there. In the two months prior, the company had hired three new people to replace employees who had left.
"There was no warning that it was going to close," says Julia Emily Hathaway, a Veazie resident and regular platelet donor since March. "It was a very nice place. Everyone was very kind and welcoming, so I enjoyed going there."
Employees at the Bangor center referred all questions to HemaCare's corporate office in Van Nuys, Calif. Efforts to reach officials there were unsuccessful.
People who donated blood or blood platelets at the Maine Blood Center said it regularly looked busy and earlier in the year the center had been revising its hours to better meet the needs of those donating.
But revenues for HemaCare have continued to drop, decreasing 19% to $8.1 million in the second quarter of 2010 compared with the same time last year. The Bangor center was one of two such operations the company managed in Maine, along with five in California, as well mobile donor vehicles, providing blood products such as whole blood and blood platelets to hospitals and research facilities. The company also provides therapeutic blood procedures, stem cell collection and other blood treatments to patients with a variety of conditions, according to company documents.
A letter dated Aug. 31 and sent to those who had donated to the center offered little in the way of explanation, stating only that it was forced to scale back as have so many other organizations.
While blood and blood product donations were made at the Bangor center, they weren't used in the area, but shipped to southern Maine for use in hospitals and facilities such as Maine Medical Center in Portland. Bangor's two hospitals, Eastern Maine Medical Center and St. Joseph Hospital, rely on organizations such as the American Red Cross for blood products.
HemaCare, through its wholly owned subsidiary Coral Blood Services Inc., once had a cozier relationship with EMMC. The two were partners in opening the Bangor center in 2002 and the center at the time sent its blood products exclusively to EMMC. When the center opened, the American Red Cross in Bangor had stopped its collection of blood platelets. In late 2002, HemaCare and the American Red Cross settled an anti-trust lawsuit, and as part of it, the Red Cross agreed not to bundle blood-related products and services in New England in a way that would constrain competition.
But last October, the American Red Cross center in Bangor began accepting blood platelet donations again. Nationally, the American Red Cross accounts for 40% of the transfusable blood products in the country, with companies like HemaCare accounting for another 50% and the remaining 10% coming from hospitals themselves, according to the HemaCare documents filed with the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission.
While officials from both hospitals say they won't be affected by the closing of the Maine Blood Center, an official from the American Red Cross blood center in Bangor says there has already been an increase in blood platelet donations there. Lisa Frazell, an account executive, says it isn't clear if the influx is from former Maine Blood Center donors or if they are people attracted by advertisements recognizing the one-year anniversary of the center restarting its blood platelet collection.
HemaCare's filings with the SEC show that demand for blood products provided by the company has not kept up with supplies. HemaCare had a stronger first half of 2009, but demand for blood products began dropping as patients deferred operations because of unemployment or concerns about the economy, HemaCare reported in SEC filings.
"This caused an unprecedented industry wide surplus of blood products as blood suppliers were generally slow to reduce production," the company says in its March filing.
That led to lower prices and to HemaCare losing market share to lower-priced competitors. Revenues for its blood services, the largest component of its income, dropped 24% to $6.2 million in the second quarter of 2010 compared to the same time in 2009. Revenues for its therapeutic services increased 5% to $1.9 million during that same time period. The company attributed the drop in revenues to a substantial reduction in the number of red blood cell purchases by one of HemaCare's high volume buyers, and increases in testing fees.
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