TD Insurance looks at growth in Atlantic Canada and beyond
The TD Insurance team in Halifax started their blood donation journey after their Partners for Life champion, Anne-Marie Skillen, organized stem cell recruitment events for her friend’s son, a four-year-old named Colton. He was diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia (juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia or JMML) and needed a stem cell transplant from a matching donor to survive.
Motivated to help him, Anne-Marie helped plan a swabbing event in 2023 where potential eligible donors swabbed the inside of their cheek to start the process of joining the stem cell registry. Anne-Marie, along with Colton’s family, organized a successful event with a radio station reporting live, free haircuts for those who registered, yummy snacks, and swag. That day, Canadian Blood Services collected a record-breaking 117 swabs from potential stem cell donors – more than any previous event in Halifax. The outpouring of support from the community was amazing!
Anne Marie took the extra step to spread the word at work and handed out swabbing kits to her eligible colleagues at TD insurance. Shortly after the event, Colton found a matching stem cell donor and received his transplant.
Inspired to do more, Anne Marie worked with Canadian Blood Services to set up a blood drive with her team at TD Insurance. Anne Marie became their Partners for Life team champion and started encouraging and recruiting people to regularly give blood. Over the course of 2024, TD Insurance brought nine busloads of donors to the Halifax donor centre.
To wrap up the year, their final bus load of dedicated donors made their way to the Halifax donor centre in late December, including Diane Wilbur who made her 100th donation. The team also celebrated exceeding their set goal of 100 donations for the year. In addition, Canadian Blood Services was invited to attend the ‘TDI Halifax Community Year-End Celebration' where the impact of Canada’s Lifeline was celebrated and more TD Insurance employees were encouraged to get started with blood donations. They even had a stem cell table set up for anyone who wanted to join the stem cell registry!
TD Insurance’s goal for 2025 is to increase their donation frequency to monthly (increasing their bus trips from 9 to 12) and to motivate other TD Insurance sites to take up this initiative nationally.
As a dedicated champion, Anne Marie wants to do more in 2025 to get the word out and is excited to see the support for Canada’s Lifeline among her TD Insurance community growing.