John C. Staley

Couple of questions for clarification. What is the specificity of the known Alloantibody? "Baby is born and our testing shows negative antibody screen." Was this AB screen done on mom or baby? If on the baby, was a current ab screen performed on mom and if so what was the results? Was a DAT performed on the baby? If so, what was the result? If not, why not? Thanks

How many units of uncrossmatched blood did they receive? How active were they bleeding? How much later did the other hospital preform their own T&S? Inquiring minds want to know!!! 😉

That was my 1st thought as well!

I hope you got that in writing or willing to argue the point some time in the future because there is a good chance the next inspector will have a different take on it. Over the years I received contradictory info from more than one inspector and often they were representing the same organization!

The birth parent caught my eye more than the bloody type did!!!!

I never regretted my individual AABB membership. They can be an excellent resource, especially in your new position. Having said that, I imagine things may have changed since my retirement. I would suggest getting a membership, if you are not seeing the cost: benefit ratio in your favor you can always cancel or just not renew.

That's interesting because I was a long time user of Immucor products. Thanks for looking that up. Now I know something I didn't know yesterday.

I'm curious, where does one find rabbit erythrocyte stroma??? Granted, none of my many years were spent working in a dedicated reference lab but I don't remember ever hearing or reading anything about this technique.

I just had a thought that might help. Some one on staff surly has a kid or grandkid with a 3D printer. I imagine they could make you a couple exactly how you want them. I have a 9 year old grandson who made me some boxes for 3 different sizes of shotgun shells. They don't look all that different from what you are looking for. Something to check into.

Over the years have I discovered that information like this is best provided to physicians by physicians. There were a few that recognized my knowledge and expertise on the subject but the vast majority did not and some were even reluctant to get it from my blood bank medical directors. I would recommend having your medical director provide the book recommended by Malcolm. I wish I had a copy in my library when I was still working. Good luck. Let us know what you end up doing and how it goes. I'm sure that this kind of problem will be with us for ever! Malcolm, you are correct, the info is relatively simple. It's getting them to step down, swallow their pride and listen that makes it difficult!

Keep in mind that in some locations the time zone could change almost across the street or just across the state line and I live 4 miles from the state line and only 60 miles from the nearest blood supplier for the local hospital. Just something to consider when making broad sweeping statements. When I was supervising a transfusion / donor service we shipped blood any where in the country that needed it if we had a surplus. Time zones were never a consideration.

If I were you I would cut my loses and go with a different company for my next analyzer. I never did like anything about Ortho and avoided dealing with them any time I had the chance. Just my opinion for what ever it's worth.

This is just one more example of how inertia is the most power force in the universe and how difficult it is to battle the "that's how we've always done it" mentality..

I'm curious, how is this group affiliated with the hospital? It seems to me that this is something that risk management should be made aware of and should, at the very least, be reviewed by the transfusion committee if your hospital has one.

If the original type is for "potential" transfusion purpose then it is confirmed and the history of that type has been validated. It can be added to the paranoid reducing comfort level in assuming the current sample is from the same patient. If, on the other hand, the original sample was ABO/Rh type for some other reason and obviously not confirmed with a 2nd type then your level of paranoid reducing comfort will not be there when the patient returns for "potential" transfusions purpose. I have never been a proponent of the required 2nd confirmation ABO/Rh type. I would like to say it was for the same reasons Neil Blumberg listed above but back when I was living in the blood banking world we did not have the data he is noting. I just could not really see the cost/benefit ratio being in anyone's favor.