Executive Q&A with Dr. John Armitage: Blood institute leader has giving in his veins

By Paula Burkes

Published: September 7, 2008

When Dr. John Armitage joined the Oklahoma Blood Institute in January last year, it became his fifth blood center in 11 years.

"Just call me an itinerant vampire,” Armitage jokes.

But the chief executive is serious about the business of transfusion medicine, and OBI in particular.

"It‘s about saving lives and investing back into the community,” he said.

At OBI, Armitage leads 650 employees across greater Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Ardmore, Ada, Lawton, Enid and Ponca City. The center provides every drop of blood needed by all Oklahoma City-area hospitals and most statewide. About 120,000 volunteer Oklahoma blood donors every year give more than 250,000 units.

"That's a huge testimony to Oklahomans that we care enough about one another to be self-sufficient,” Armitage said. "Still, with O-negative, my blood type, we're operating with only a three-day supply. We wouldn't feel comfortable doing that with vaccines, sutures or other medical needs. And we shouldn't with blood.”

Armitage, 44, sat down with The Oklahoman recently to talk about his personal and professional life. The following is an edited transcript:

Q: Tell us about your roots.

A: My dad is British and my mom was Canadian. I'm a naturalized citizen and the youngest of their three sons. We grew up in Durham, N.C., with family values much like Oklahomans'.

My dad was an English professor at the University of North Carolina, and my mom was a typing teacher. She died when I was 15 of scleroderma, an autoimmune disorder that causes the overgrowth of connective tissue. Fortunately, we'd been encouraged to do laundry and cook for ourselves. Then, shortly after her death, I was accepted into the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics state-run boarding school.

So being off at school, studying and playing soccer helped with the transition.

Q: What made you choose history for your undergraduate degree at Yale?

A: As pre-med, I knew I'd spend my whole life in biology, so I wanted to major in something else. To me, history is almost like a laboratory. You can look back and see cause and effect of what transpired.

Q: How'd you decide on transfusion medicine?

A: I looked at surgery, internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology ... the big blocks everyone considers. But I was drawn to clinical pathology: the study of blood gases, chemistry and other pathology.

It's the foundation of all care given, but it doesn't get a lot of attention. Within clinical pathology, I became interested in transfusion medicine. At the time, it seemed risky — perhaps a little too narrow. But that's where my interests were and I followed them. It's turned out to be great. I'd encourage anyone to follow their interests.

Q: Tell us about your career before coming to Oklahoma.

A: Mostly it's been with the American Red Cross. I worked six years with the Carolinas Blood Services Region, as medical director and chief medical officer, but quickly realized that if I was going to affect the medical environment, I needed to move into administration. I served four years as CEO for American Red Cross regions in Roanoke Va., my wife's hometown, and Johnstown, Pa. A year into the latter appointment, the Red Cross restructured. Instead of moving to western Pennsylvania, we moved to New Brunswick, NJ where I worked a one-year stint as executive director/vice president of the New Jersey Blood Services for the New York Blood Center before coming here.

Q: I'm a regular blood donor and feel like there's been greater telemarketing efforts made to schedule my donations, as well as on-site rescheduling of follow-up appointments. Is this new?

A: We really value people's time, so we're trying to coordinate appointments to cut down on any wait times. In addition to new online scheduling, we give beepers to employees at workplace drives, so we can beep them when they‘re ready and not waste their work time. We figure if it works for Outback restaurant, it can work for us.

Q: I understand one in three of us will need blood in our lifetimes, but fewer than 10 percent donate. Why do you think that is?

A: I don't think we do a good job of asking. We need to do a better job of connecting donors to patient groups in their constituencies so they have a more vested interest and understand how the blood is used. We've made blood donation seem routine when it's really extraordinary. Instead of saying "blood donations save lives,” we need to be telling how — by sustaining premature babies or preventing cancer patients from having a stroke.

Giving blood allows us to heal others by giving of ourselves. Literally. I'm proud to be a multigallon donor.

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