Blood Bank usage by Covid19 Patients

[Neil Blumberg]

We have about 30 patients in our ICU and about 60 outside the ICU.  Almost no transfusions to these patients,  and our intensivists and hospitalists are not enthusiastic about transfusions of any sort in these patients.  Skeptical about the net benefits of convalescent plasma as well, particularly in the most severely ill patients, for a variety of reasons.  We will only be transfusing convalescent plasma as part of randomized trials as a general rule.  Most importantly, transfusions should not be based primarily on laboratory abnormalities such as the hematocrit/hemoglobin, PT, PTT, etc. in the absence of life threatening anemia or bleeding.