Press Release

Joseph Pilo of Westhampton, center, receives a plaque and a wristwatch from the staff of the Blood Bank at Stony Brook University Hospital (SBUH) in appreciation of his donating platelets 200 times over the course of eight years. Pilo has donated every two weeks, saved countless lives and saved the hospital approximately $200,000 in platelet acquisition costs. At right is Dennis Galanakis, M.D., Associate Professor of Pathology and Medicine at Stony Brook University School of Medicine and Director of the Blood Bank at SBUH, who thanked Pilo on behalf of the many patients who have benefited from his donations. “There is no way you could hear their thanks,” he said, “so this is our way of saying it for them.”