Deloris Jordan, mother of basketball icon Michael Jordan, and Midmark President Mitch Eiting participated in the Midmark employee blood drive on November 2.
Submitted photo | Solvita
VERSAILLES — Midmark’s Nov. 2 employee blood drive made history, not least because the donor was joined by Deloris Jordan, mother of world basketball icon Michael Jordan and president of the James R. Jordan International Foundation The unexpected visit was also due to the blood donation event, which totaled 62 donors and 55 donation units.
Since Midmark began hosting blood drives in 2011, Solvita (formerly Community Blood Center) has officially donated more than 7,000 units of blood.
Mitch Eiting, president of the Midmark Foundation, manager of philanthropic and corporate giving and blood drive coordinator, said in a press release from Solvita: “We called up the visit by Deloris Jordan numbers.” “We realized we were getting close to 7,000 people and we thought, ‘This is cool.'”
Midmark partners with the Jordan Foundation to donate medical equipment to Kenya’s Women and Children’s Health Center. During his visit to the Experience Center, Jordan toured the production facility where the equipment is manufactured and visited a blood drive.
“How cool!” Jordan spoke with Midmark donor Allen York as he made his 28th lifetime donation. “It was a surprise. “We saw a lot of people come in and think, ‘What’s going on here? ‘”
Jordan first worked with Solvita COO Diane Wilson in 2009 on a project to provide skin grafts to burn patients following the fires in Nairobi, Kenya. After Midmark’s visit, she visited the Solvita Dayton Center.
“This is a blood drive,” Jordan said in the release. “When I went to Midmark, there was another blood donation event. Everywhere I go, you are struggling for blood, but you will need it because it brings hope.”
Corporate blood drives have been halted during the pandemic. After a two-month hiatus at Midmark, Etting developed a plan to resume employee blood drives at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Versailles.
Midmark now hosts monthly employee blood drives at its Versailles campus and sponsors six community blood drives annually at the KOC lobby.
“We’ve had our ups and downs, but we’re back on campus,” Etting said. “We did a blood drive at the Kuwait Olympic Committee and had some people come back. When we got back to campus we thought, ‘Oh, I’ll donate again,’ and that made a difference.”
The new Experience Center is now the central location for all employee blood drives. Eiting said engagement has been on the rise since the new online communication system was implemented. He said that with the help of Supervisor Jason Hemmelgarn, Midmark’s night shift blood drives increased by 25 percent.
“When we started in 2011, we were looking for volunteer opportunities in the community,” Eiting said. “It just so happened that two of our teammates had done blood drives there as a way to give back to the community and allow employees to donate during work hours.”
Etting said this type of opportunity is now a tradition at Midmark, attracting new employees interested in corporate social responsibility.
“Every donation has the potential to save three lives. It’s a lot of money and it’s paying off. They don’t have to donate; they do it because they want to. They’ll come back to our car when It warms my heart when this happens,” said Eiting.
Make an appointment to donate with Solvita through the Donor Time app, call 937-461-3220 or visit www.donortime.com.