A 21-year-old woman has lost mobility in her right arm following a botched blood donation in which a nurse allegedly drew blood from one of her arteries instead of a vein.

Gabriela Ekman, of Ontario, Canada, had just turned 17 when she decided to donate blood for the first time in her life. She hoped it would make a difference, maybe even save someone’s life, but she had no idea it would actually change her life for the worse. When she went to a blood drive hosted by Canadian Blood Services four years ago, she didn’t know what to expect, but when the the phlebotomist who drew her blood let out a “whoops” when she stung her arm with a needle, she knew something wasn’t right. But she didn’t say anything, not even when the staff commented on how oxygenated her blood seemed, an indication that it may have come from an artery, instead of a vein. By the time she realized something was definitely wrong, it was too late…

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Blood Sport is a new gaming system that’s all set to revolutionize the way we donate blood. While traditional blood donation methods can be ‘draining’ to say the least, the makers of Blood Sport have designed a fun process that involves playing video games. You’ll be so immersed in the game that you’ll hardly notice the blood being taken from you every time you lose a life

Blood Sport is the brainchild of Canadian inventors Taran Chadha and Jamie Umpherson, who are well-known for gaming-related projects like Shoot the Banker, Surrogaid and Prank House. Now, with Blood Sport, they’re “taking the consequences of the gaming world and having them affect you in real life. So every time you get hit in the game, blood will be intravenously drawn from your arm.”

Their new idea, they say, is stupidly simple. “Nowadays, most video game controllers rumble when you get shot in the game,” they explained on their Kickstarter page, through which they’re trying to raise $250,000 CAD (US $222,700). “That rumbling means that an electrical signal is being sent to the controller to let you know you’ve been hit. All we’re doing is re-routing that same electrical signal and using it to turn on the blood collection system.”

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