I am a nurse reviewer, and am reviewing a neonatal chart. The patient gets RBC aliquots, some days they bill for RBC Aliquots and splitting, some days they bill for the same as well as a unit of RBCs. It seems they should only bill for the Aliquot the pateint received, not the whole unit, as well. Am I correct or wrong? Thank you.

Are you aure they are charging for the whole unit and not the remainder of the unit? I agree with you that the charge should not be for the whole unit plus all of the aliquots. Some places use one unit for a baby and when the unit expires, they charge the remainder, since it could not be used for anyone else. You might contact your blood bank to see why the charges went through that way.

Thanks. This baby just came in the day before, and received 15cc RBC. I notice on subsequent days they only charge for the RBC aliquots. I think there must have been some sort of charging problem. Thanks for the advice, I'll check into that!

Under the new ISBT labeling system, an aliquot (ISBT divided) unit has the split designation attached to the unit #. ie AO, BO, CO, DO....depending on how many times the parent unit was split. The next generation of split units would have another designation. If the unit has that designation it is billed at the divided price, if not no matter how much of the unit was transfused it is billed at the full unit price. We bill all divided units that have been ordered (designated) for a specific patient to that patient account if transfused, any other splits from that designated unit are billed to the hospital as wasted.