[Protamine Sulphate? FDP?]

Just wondering if anyone is still using the Protamine Sulphate? Or an FDP for DICs. Or if they report out just a D-Dimer? Thanks

[Plasma Protamine Paracoagulation]

Wondering about this as well....We still do a Protamine for any abnormal DIC...but is the testing still necessary? Couldn't we do a FDP for ease of use? But really...are either test REALLY necessary any longer?

[Auto antibody]

If you have a negative DAT? We don't call anything like that at all. Interesting....

[Rouleaux in Gel]

Have any other primarily Gel users noticed an increase in Rouleaux in the last 6 months? We have the Provue and do gel manually but have had an increasing need for tube screens because of the pesky rouleaux. Rouleaux used to be a rare incovenience but now we are almost seeing one a day. Any info appreciated.....

[UPDATE: Pre-Pooled Cryo. Expiration]

Let us know what you find out Brenda. I will definitely pass this onto our BB supervisor because we use prepooled cryo products but my understanding of the process was that they pooled them before freezing so I will definitely check into it! Thanks again.

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

No doubt my rare is WAY different than yours !

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

To me your kee phrase here is "that they have phenotyped"...I thought you stated ARC was going on only historical information?!

Nope....we get out blood from our supplier. Our blood supplier has "historical" antigen histories of donors. Rare cases of difficult antibodies crossmatches we have to rely on the ARC for units. They phenotype.

Clear as mud I know.

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

WHOA!! Seriously?? NO NO NO!! You are being supplied by a donor facility that does not confirm "historic" types on each donation?? RUN RUN RUN away from them...if you have the option. If you don't, then you should be confirming antigen status upon the unit's arrival in your BB.

Sorry to be so forceful, but this practice is just plain wrong.

We do confirm antigen status from our blood supplier. The reference laboratory is the one we do not phenotype again if it is a rare unit....

Hope that helps to make it clear as mud....

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

Nope! We retype the blood. Phenotype if necessary. But if a ARC sends us a rare unit that they have phenotyped and it is IAT compatible then we don't redo all the phenotypes.....it happens pretty rarely that we have to get units from Red Cross....

[Hi, new to the site]

I've just started and it is AMAZING the breadth of knowledge of the seasoned posters here....GREAT resource!!

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

Yeah...in our blood suppliers defense...they do not perform phenotyping at all...they are dependent on the phenotypes provided by hospitals which then they enter slowly to donor record for "hisotrically" antigen negative unit searches.

[Discrepancies in Antigen Typing]

We have not encountered a phenotype mismatch from the reference lab. We however do encounted a phenotype discrepancy from our donor center somewhat often..ie...unit is supposed to be antigen negative and isn't.

[Crossmatch on ProVue]

Our Provue is not interfaced. We are still on a paper system with manual test entry. We do IAT xms if needed on the Provue. It is very slick. We also use the Provue for routine TXMs with IS crossmatches and the assorted TYSC.

[Emergency Transfusion O pos or O neg?]

We just switched our "Code red" protocol to release Oneg or O pos depending on the rh..before we were giving type specific uncrossed if needed by doing a quick front type but I guess that was against AABB recomendations. So now once we have a complete type (front and back) we switch types if needed. We also do not have anything documented about giving Rh pos to Rh neg when appropriate. It would be nice to have some more wiggle room on certain occasions though.

[Blood pick up]

We are still on a mostly paper system so we have the nurses/cnas bring a duplicate form with the labels of who they are transfusing. We then match it with our information and then write the unit on that duplicate form. Also, we have a triplicate form for the original work documentation that must be present for every unit. Very cumbersome. But at least we have the doublecheck of their vs. ours. I guess. This is the first facility I have worked without a computer system for BB but without the budget we do what we can......

[PFA-100 does anyone use canned comments?]

We only have one canned comment that we use when the HCT is less than 35 and the platelets are less than a 100...something along the lines that either of these could cause elevated results

[How many times do you perform an antibody identification?]

We do a new panel and id every 72 hours. We send out to reference laboratory any that we get that are warm autos.

[Blood Bank Automation]

We use the Provue. It is very batch oriented. It works best if the testing is organized into batches. Not that you would have to wait to "batch" your testing just organizeour cards to make it easier to for the Provue to think. There is the fact that you have to wait until your incubation is done to add more specimens unless you STAT interrupt. Overall it is very easy to use. Pretty sturdy little machine. It also provides a digital pic of each component of your TYSC or TXM so you can have a digital recheck.

[Hello from IA]

Hi. I am an evening shift generalist at a level 2 trauma center in Sioux City. BB is my favorite department. We use Gel and the Provue.

[Just For Fun]

***From a patient, after being in the bathroom for an hour to collect a semen analysis: "I'm sorry, I just couldn't get it to the fill line" ***

Now THAT is funny!

[can you tell if Rouleaux is present just from looking at the gel card?]

We look for it in a tube microscopically when we suspect it in the gel. Then we fall back to tube method to alleviate the rouleaux. We see it quite often. Probably one of the few drawbacks to gel.