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Understanding Blood Types
Your blood is made up of red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, that are all floating in a liquid called plasma. Your blood is made up of antibodies and antigens. The antibodies are proteins in your plasma that act as your natural defense. They will recognize if there is a foreign substance in the body and trigger an immune system response. Antigens are protein molecules that are found on the surface of the red blood cells. Antigens help identify substances in your body if they either belong or don’t belong.
Knowing your blood type can be essential for blood transfusions or organ transplants. Blood type is the medical system put into place to see if one type of blood is compatible with another. This can be life saving in some situations. If you are given blood you are not compatible to it can cause a life threatening adverse reaction.
Blood Types
There are four main blood types; A, B, AB, and O.
These are found using the ABO system. This system checks for the A antigen or the B antigen on your red blood cells. If you have type A, your red blood cells have the A antigen. If you have type B, your red blood cells have the B antigen. If you have type AB, your red blood cells have both the A antigen and the B antigen. If you have type O, your red blood cells have neither the A antigen or the B antigen.
Along with the ABO system, there is also the Rhesus factor system, or the Rh factor D system. This system checks if your blood has the Rh factor D antigen. If your blood cells contain the Rh factor D antigen then you have a positive blood type. If your red blood cells do not contain the Rh D antigen then you have a negative blood type.
Leaving there to be 8 different types of blood that is possible: A positive, A negative, B positive, B negative, AB positive, AB negative, O positive, or O negative.
Knowing what type of blood you have can help know what types of blood you are compatible with. If you have Rh negative blood you can donate to either Rh negative or positive blood. If you have Rh positive blood you can only donate to Rh positive blood. The universal donor is O negative. The universal plasma donor is AB blood.
A positive blood you can give blood to a person with A positive or AB positive blood and you can receive blood from someone with A positive, A negative, O positive or O negative blood.
O positive blood can give to O positive, A positive, B positive, or AB positive, and receive blood from O positive or O negative.
B positive blood can donate blood to B positive, or AB positive and receive blood from B positive, B negative, O positive, or O negative.
AB positive blood can donate to AB positive blood or receive blood from every type.
A negative blood can donate blood to A positive, A negative, AB positive, or AB negative and receive blood from A negative, or O negative.
O negative blood can donate to every blood type, but only receive from O negative.
B negative blood can donate blood to B positive, B negative, AB positive, or AB negative, and receive from B negative, or O negative blood.
AB negative blood can donate to AB positive or AB negative, and receive blood from AB negative, A negative, B negative or O negative blood.
Genetics
Your blood type is inherited from your parents. Both ABO genes and Rh factor genes are inherited by your parents. This could mean that your blood type does not match your parents, if parents have two different blood types. If the mother becomes pregnant the mother and baby may not have the same type of blood. This can cause trouble during pregnancy and delivery if the Rh factors do not match. The mother’s body may see the baby’s blood supply as an attack from a foreign substance.
Blood Type & Health Risk
There are other complications that can come with what type of blood type you have. These raised risks of health concerns does not mean you are destined to have medical troubles because of your blood type, but some research has been done and linked to blood type and raised risks with some medical conditions.
If you have types A or B blood you have a higher risk of blood clots. Types A and B have a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
Mosquitoes prefer type O blood over others, but if you have type O blood you have a lower risk of getting malaria, because the parasite that causes malaria has a harder time attaching to O blood cells. O blood has a lower risk of coronary heart disease. People with O blood also seem to live longer. Peptic ulcers seem to be more common in people with O blood type.
Type A blood has a higher risk of stomach cancer. Type A blood people tend to have higher levels of cortisol causing them to not handle stress well.
A, AB, and B blood types have a higher risk for pancreatic cancer.
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