TroyStrong drive gathers critical blood in Havre

At St. Jude Parish Center Wednesday, Red Cross held the TroyStrong Blood Drive, sponsored by Montana State University-Northern, where people in the Havre area donated blood in an event honoring the struggles of a young Great Falls boy who's life was saved by donated blood.

In 2017, Troy Ross, 2 years old at the time, was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease that required him to have 75 percent of his blood transfused, along with almost 100 more transfusions since then.

Ross is now in full remission after this battery of treatment and his father, Wes Ross, one of the primary organizers for the drive, said this recent news is a real blessing and the joy of this year's drive.

Ross said that, late in 2017, his son started looking sick and after taking him to the emergency room his condition began to rapidly deteriorate, and before they knew it they were on a mercy flight taking him to another hospital where he needed to be put into a medically induced coma.

He said it took two weeks to get a diagnosis and he and his wife did all they could for their son, but eventually they had to accept that he was in the hands of the doctors and they were at the limits of what they could do.

To cope with the trauma and sense of powerlessness, he said, they needed something to do and decided if they couldn't help their son they would help others like him and settled on running blood drives in his honor.

During the mercy flight, Ross said, Troy needed the donated blood of nine people just to make it to Seattle, and it became very clear to them how vital donated blood is to people across the U.S. and the world.

He said they started the TroyStrong Blood Drive and, though Montana was their main area of focus, people across the U.S. ended up donating.

Troy's condition stabilized, and his father said he's now doing phenomenally well, achieving full remission and recently having had the port used for his frequent blood transfusions removed.

"We're really jumping for joy after almost five years," Ross said.

But despite this recovery, he said, the need for blood for others is not going away, and he aims to keep the drive going for as long as people are willing to donate, which he thinks will be a very long time.

This year, he said, they are going to be in 11 cities across Montana and some loyal blood donors in Seattle and Denver have gotten in touch asking if they could help set up drives in their areas.

He said they are shooting for 600 donations this week.

Ross said he wants to thank everyone who donates as well as the drives' sponsors and organizers, including American Red Cross Lewis and Clark Region Senior Donor Recruitment Representative Scott Shanahan, who's been instrumental in making these drives happen.

In particular, he said, he wants to thank Northern's football team for their consistent support for the drives with then-coach Andrew Rolin helping to start the drives in Havre and his successor, coach Jerome Souers, continuing that legacy.

Ross said when he first met Souers, the first thing out of the coach's mouth was asking how he could support the drive, not player recruitment or anything like that, just how he and the team can help.

For his part, Shanahan said, it's still early in the drive, but they are having good turnout.

He said there's always a dip in donations overall during the summer due to schools being closed for vacation, and this year has been no different, but it's something they always deal with.

The TroyStrong drive this summer started in Bozeman, and Havre was one of four locations Wednesday, along with Billings, Helena and Kalispell.

The drive continued Thursday in Great Falls and Missoula, is happening today in Butte and will be in Dillon June 29 and in Bozeman June 30.