pdavenport

We've been using the Raycell for over 5 years. The cabinet is approximately 4X5X2 ft. It's lead lined and sits on casters. You need a water line, a drain, and 220 electrical line. The canister will hold two AS-1 RBC or several pheresis platelets. Our cycle is 5 min. The maintenence is minimal and dosimetry checks are not complicated. We have a radiation physicist check for leakage one a year. I think they're going for about $180K, but you'd need to check the current pricing with Nordion.

900 AM- Receive specimen
901 AM- Receive phone call from OR asking if blood set up on Room 3- spend 3 minutes on hold while OR finds out name of patient in Room 3, 1 minute looking up patient in computer and answering "No, no specimen was submitted for testing," 1 minute explaining why it will take 40 minutes to an hour to perform a stat workup ("it's STAT! Don't you understand!?"), 1 minute to explain that emergency release blood is always available, 1 minute on hold because the surgeon wants to chew someone out, 1 minute to explain to surgeon "no specimen- no compatibility testing, no mind readers on duty in the blood bank"
909 AM- Accession specimen into computer and place in centrifuge
910 AM- Take specimen to testing rack and begin pipetting
911 AM- Release 2 emergency release units for patient in OR 3 to angry anesthesiologist (2 minute rant), explain that testing requires a specimen (1 minute)
915 AM- Back to bench- pipet screen cells and plasma into gel card and begin 15-minute incubation
917- Phone call from Day Surgery saying that a specimen was drawn for compatibility testing on patient in OR 3 only five days earlier; spend 3 minutes explaining that specimen is good for 3 days unless waiver is signed, and no waiver (not transfused, not pregnant) on file, and no date of surgery on request, and no mind readers on duty in blood bank when request for T&C received; 1 minute giving Day Surgery phone number of medical director so they can report us for not having mind readers on duty, 1 minute kicking side of file cabinet to keep from going down to Day Surgery and throttling the Day Surgery nurse, who has an associate degree and knows all there is to know about blood.
923 AM- Issue 2 units of RBC to ICU, 1 unit to PACU, two platelet units to Hem/Onc (can someone give me a hand at the issue window?), and 15 FFP for exchange transfusion.
940 AM- Do ABO/Rh and place gel screen in gel card centrifuge (5 minutes)
945 AM- Field call from Medical Director, who has spent 10 minutes on phone with surgeon of patient in OR 3 (5 minutes saying who said what and when)
950 AM- pull gel card from centrifuge to read, then answer the phone call from 5 South wanting to know if we have a current specimen on Room 517 Bed A, explain that we have some metal shavings from the left leg of the bed, but that they were rusty and we needed a new specimen, and if she needed any blood on the patient in Bed A, then we would need a blood specimen from the patient as well, and be sure to find out what that patient's name is.
955 AM- read gel card, enter results into computer
1000 AM- Confirm results in computer for Type and screen
Any questions?
BC