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Blood wastage a thing of the past – NBTS Director
Dr. Pedro Lewis
Since taking up the portfolio of Director of the National Blood Transfusion Service – the country’s national blood banking facility – Dr. Pedro Lewis, said that there has been no incident of blood wastage there.
He made this remark during an invited comment solicited by this publication earlier this week. “I have been here for two years and we haven’t had any wastage of blood or blood products,” said Dr. Lewis. He underscored that the possibility of blood being wasted at the NBTS would in fact be a near impossible state of affairs, since there is always a need for blood.
A few years ago the NBTS was subjected to some flak, when reports surfaced that it had discarded some donated blood. The state of affairs had reportedly caused a number of donors to refrain from voluntarily giving blood, since they were concerned that their blood would go to waste.
It was revealed that prior to this method being implemented some blood in storage had to be discarded since they had exceeded the recommended shelf life. While there are reports that suggest that blood banks store blood for six weeks as the standard shelf life for the purpose of transfusion, a study done in the United States had in fact suggested this timeline be shortened to three weeks.
This development was proposed because it was found that after the three-week period, red cells in stored blood lose their ability to deliver oxygen where it is most needed.
But Dr. Lewis insisted that given the limited supply of blood and the continued dire need for the life-saving substance since he took the reins of the NBTS, there hasn’t been any need to waste any amount of blood.
While the need is all-encompassing in terms of the various blood types, Dr. Lewis disclosed that the type that continues to be most commonly needed is O Positive. The other blood types are: O negative, A Positive, A Negative, B Positive, B Negative, AB Positive and AB Negative.
The national blood bank is tasked with collecting, screening and storing blood, which is requested by various health facilities to help save lives.
Currently, the NBTS’s collection of blood is dependent on a 98 percent voluntary donor population. Although the NBTS is hoping to realise 100 percent voluntary donation, Dr. Lewis is somewhat cynical that this could be realised in the near future.
“You have to remember that when a person is in the hospital, they would try to gather as many relatives as possible to come and give blood….we may call it voluntary donation because we are not forcing them to come, they come of their own free will, but our statistics has to reflect that it is family members,” said Dr. Lewis.
He noted that while persons will not be dissuaded from giving blood, the ideal voluntary donor is an individual who, without being coerced, opts to donate blood that can help to save lives.
Although the NBTS has been in the business of collecting whole blood from donors after which various blood products such as platelets, plasma and cryoprecipitate are separated, the NBTS was recently furnished with a Apheresis Machine, which not only gives it the capability to collect an increased quantity of blood but also simultaneously separates the various blood products that are needed. This machine, valued at US$94,000, is expected to vastly improve the efficiency of the NBTS and thereby reduce the challenge of blood shortage.
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