lawblood

Would appreciate any advice from a billing/compliance expert. We charge both patients, though that doesn't seem quite right. I agree with Swede.

Good for you that you were able to control the upgrade!

I'm also getting ready to test out the ShockWatch TrekView gadget - to monitor internal temperature of the cooler - they are less than $50 each. Can be used up to 26 times. They are cute, too!

We recently purchased a ScanTemp 485 temp gun. Have been very pleased. Validated it against our NIST thermometer. Of course, now we are discarding more products .

I appreciate the comments this post has generated. The other day, one of our PCs locked up over a screen saver. I've gotten permission to remove hospital network screen savers from our PCs. Hopefully, that will help. My sympathies to Michaele and her experiences with swapping out her PCs without any warning. It's very hard for hospital IT techs to understand that a BBLIS is a medical device.

Well, this discussion has given this old-fashioned Blood Banker something to think about. Interestingly, our donor center reference lab has stopped automatically supplying phenotypically-matched RBCs if there are no alloantibodies detected under the WARM. If the patient later develops an allo, then pheno-matched RBCs are provided. We had a slightly different situation occur in our lab last week. Patient had a history of WARM due to Evans Syndrome (autoimmune). This time however, only the DAT was positive. The Gel screen and IgG crossmatch were negative. The eluate was reactive with all cells. The sample was sent to the reference lab and they came back with the same results. They only recommended what we had already done. My question is: if the WARM is not spilling over to the plasma, would it be safe to issue crossmatch (in our case, Gel)-compatible RBCs for transfusion? I think I am getting too conservative in my old age.

Without disclosing the vendor, the problem was that the tech could select a patient name to work on, but the application would display a different name. The was corrected after the tech changed their personal Display settings in Windows 7. The application was initially validated using Windows XP and there were no performance issues. The application is approved to run on Windows 7 by the vendor...apparently they did not experience this same issue. My only intention of this post is to heighten your awareness of potential problems with Windows 7 and your BBIS.

Although our vendor states our version is compatible with Windows 7, there have been some issues with the display and how the appilcation performs. We had recently upgraded a few months ago, but the validation was done using Windows XP. I would strongly suggest you load Windows 7 to 1 PC and do some testing before you load to the rest of your workstations.

Recently, our IT department upgraded 2 PCs in the department from Windows XP to Windows 7. Soon after, we started experiencing some changes to our BBIS. We had to get each user to go in and individually change their display settings in Windows to correct the issue(s). Has anyone else had unnverving performance issues since going up with W7? The issue(s) have been reported to the vendor, and I do not want to disclose the product in public.

Do you consider this competency checklist to be complete enough?

My recent AABB assessor also stressed the need to include pre- and post-analytic elements to your competency program. Mine apparently was good enough, so I'm back to the drawing board. The above-quoted CAP guideline is more inclusive "A TEST SYSTEM is the process that includes pre-analytic, analytic, and post-analytic steps used to produce a test result or set of results. This is where you would include review of patient labels and reporting issues. She said to be sure to include not just the analytic testing in the competency.

Say No! I had to do this at another site. You were worn out by the 3rd haul. Your techs need to stay in the Blood Bank...they have other patients to care for, anyway.

A year later, I would like to add to this discussion. I did find a reference in the 1999 and 1985 Technical Manuals instructing the tech to use the same diluent for the RBC suspension as whatever is used to dilute the antibody. I too have the remnants of an old SOP which I just recently updated. I kept the 6% albumin method and one of my techs questioned how to make the RBC suspension. For most of our titrations, we will use the AABB-recommended saline method. The albumin method will only be for rare occasions.

I am reviewing CAP TRM.40820 regarding history checks on perinatal samples. Currently, we are not doing this on our prenatal samples. My staff groans at the thought due to our high volume. However, I am beginning to think we should. What is the consensus out there? Thanks in advance for your replies.

I recently purchased a REVCO Plasma Freezer. It has a nifty alarm check by which the sensor itself (not the whole freezer) is warmed to the cutoff temp to check the alarm. Any thoughts about if I can use this method to test my alarm instead of the "leave the freezer door open until the alarm goes off" method? Thanks in advance for the forthcoming opinions! Leslie