n.peters

We are currently doing platelet counts on our full products as well as our spilts. How many places are just doing a platelet count on the full and using that number to calculate the splits yield with the volume? Thanks

Thanks! I talked to the rep and the linearity goes up to 5 million which is great.

I am looking at purchasing a new analyzer for my donor center. We do donor pre/post counts and product QC so I need something that has a high linearity for platelets. I have the TRC-C from CAP and it seems that the number of labs using the SYSMEX XE-2100/L (Blood Center) is the highest. Does anybody have a preference if they have used multiple instruments? We process approximately 3400 units of pheresis platelets /year (I do not have the Donor # breakdown). Thanks!

Does anybody have a validation plan or suggestions for freezing FFP in Pedi-packs after collection? Specifically what did you test pre freezing / post thaw. What bags do you use? Also I asked a local hospital lab if they could test my samples for me and they said they could not be sure of the results since in is not in the right anticoagulant.

I was curious what others are doing when it comes to directed donors and ABO/Rh compatibility with recipient. Do you do a pre-type on the donor and/or recipient prior to collection to see if they are compatible? or Do you just collect the donor and state that they may or may not be available due to ABO/Rh compatibility and the let the transfusion facility determine that? Thanks!

Thanks for the replies on switching.

I would like to switch from using serum to plasma. Did anybody do some kind of validation when switching or has it just become acceptable practice to use plasma.

I was wondering how others do their percent recovery on whole blood and apheresis red cells. Do you do it by weight or mass? Also, for anybody that has the Haemonetics MCS+ LN 8150, if you do the 832F kit how are you calculating red cell recovery? Thanks

Does anyone else sometimes have trouble with slight hemolysis being called icteric? I used to run into that problem with the chemistry department. BBK would call it slight hemolysis and chemistry would call it slightly icteric. More than a couple times I have seen a recollect come back perfect. (Patient Samples) Along these same lines, what do you do when you have a hemolyzed unit whether slight or gross? In processesing we look at the process, but after storage or if it returned from a consignee do you start the investigation assuming the unit is contaminated and culture (worst case scenario)? Just curious what others do. Thanks!

Is anybody using BBCS for transfusion service functions? I have been looking at it and it seems cumbersome but I think that is mainly because my experience has been with windows based Meditech. If you do use it what sort of functions do you utilize? I know the question is vague but I am not sure what it is capable of and how user friendly it is for transfusion service/consultaton. Thanks.

Does the specific gravity for a component change if it is washed? The Tech Manual state that the specific gravity of RBCs is 1.100. In my computer system the SG has been entered for WLRBCs as 1.060 and I can not for the life of me find a reference for that. Would the density change based on the crit? If anybody could shed some light on this I would really appreciate it. Thank you!

Thanks Cliff - I did get the letter I was just trying to figure out what to do now that I had ordered the CAP PT rather than going with Pall. Did you re-order the CAP for this year or are you only doing your own inoculation?

If you are doing bacterial detection testing on platelets using Pall eBDS, how are you doing the proficiency testing. Those that used the CAP PT last year did not pick up the organism. If you did use CAP last year are you going to re-order this year or are you going to use alternate methods of PT? Has CAP had an explanation to the problem?

This is a question for medium-small blood centers. We are a blood center that does approx. 30,000 collections/year. We do some consultation/apheresis/whole blood and recovered plasma. All donor testing is sent out. I have limited staff that is overwhelmed by the on-call for consultation. There is not quite enough consultation to make a evening/night shift options viable. Without dropping the consultation (not really an option), I am stuck. How do others handle staffing for medium sized donor centers? Do you do any additional consultation? Any suggestions on increasing services so you could have more staff? I think doing more antibody consultation for area hospitals is a good option but I am not sure if we would have to be an IRL to do this. If anybody has any good staffing suggestions I would really love to hear what you have done. Thanks!

How do you determine your minimum volume for plasma (whole blood and apheresis) products? I can not find any clear guidelines.

I am in the process of either replacing or repairing many of my sementing devices (sealers). I am looking at all the different options and I was wondering if anybody wanted to share their good/bad experiences with table top rapid sealer and hand sealers brands. We are a medium sized blood center. Any feedback would be much appreciated!

We always pooled 6 - 10 units and then we realized that we could not pool more than six and still consider them leukoreduced. If a random LR plt has to be <8.3 x 10^5 then you can not pool more than six.

Does anybody still use poly AHG when testing antibodies? If so what is your reasoning? Thanks!

I am validating a new Hematology analyzer for our pre/post pheresis platelet counts for a back up. We also use it for QC on pheresis platelets. I had a few questions for anyone else who does similar testing. Do you do linearity studies every six months? The manufacturer is saying this is what CLIA is now requiring. The kits are expensive to do if you have more than one instrument. That brings me to the next question. We have an older instrument that would be back up to the new one but the new instrument runs higher than the old one on the platelet counts. Sometimes more than 30,000 difference. Supposedly they correlate but I can not see how that is accurate if they can be so different. Anybody have experience? My last question is, most cell counting machines require EDTA samples for testing. But the pheresis is collected in ACD-A. The manufacturer recommended going to the literature. I was just wondering what instruments others are using and does anyone know any references about how ACD-A affects platelet counts. Thanks!

Is anybody using the ECHO for very small volumes (10-20 xmatchs/week)?

Now that the November 2008 deadline has come and gone, does anyone want to share what they are doing to for platelet products and female donors. Did you convert female donors to whole blood only? Are you obtaining history? Does anyone do the RCPL pools? Are you doing more of those to make up for the loss of female apheresis donors?

I also can not believe it was considered a near-miss. To me if it happened and was not caught it should be treated like worst case because it was just by chance it was not, it still happened. Luckily it did not hurt that particular patient but what difference does that really make if it could happen again.

It does not look like the typical "egg drop soup" fibrin to me. It looks almost chunky and the segments look like they are all clumped up and maybe some of the clumps have fallen into the unit. So I supposed it could be denatured protein, what does that normally look like?

Has anyone had any problems with plasma defrosters (microwaves) causing fibrin in the bag? We are see chunks of fibrin in a lot of returned units and the segments have a lot of fibrin in them. Thanks for your feedback.

If you search for antigen negative units or do consultation for another facility how do you determine what and how to charge for antigen typing? Do you calculate how much a drop of antisera costs and pass that on? Are there any guidelines on how to charge? Thanks