At what level do you protect you donor information?

Here is an interesting scenario that came up at a meeting in AABB 2004 Baltimore.

A husband and wife arrive at your center to donate. The wife answers all questions truthfully, qualifies and successfully donates.

The husband indicates that he has an ongoing sexual relationship with another man.

Obviously you permanently defer the husband, but what will you do with the wife?

We have had this situation occur. We felt we could not violate the confidentiality of the husband's information, so we have tried two things:

(1) talked with the husband and explained to him that we could not use his spouse's blood & sometimes he then talks with his spouse; or (2) we apply a 'draw & discard' code to the wife's record & do not use her blood if she returns to donate.

Thanks for the reply.

I find the second approach the safest compromise. IT does allow for the risk of the quarantined unit being mistakenly introduced into the inventory.

Do you only have one instance of this? About how many product do you collect annually?

We collect about 70,000 donations per year. We have had this situation with the husband's confidential info & his wife donating either 2 or 3 times in the past 4 years that I have been here. Even if I do speak with the male donor & tell him we cannot use his spouse's blood, we do still apply the "draw and discard" code.

We do not violate the confidential nature of the information given by the husband. We would counsel the husband on the importance of relaying this information to his blood-donor wife. The wife would have a surveillance assertion applied in the computer system that would prevent any product from being distributed and initiate the discard process, should she continue to donate.