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comment_45247

I am a newbie technologist only 4 years and bloodbanking for 2 years in a large hospital (trama 1). I fell into this career in which I love and now terrified my boss is reading this....:). I ran into this website looking up a reference question in which two of my superiors do not agree on and of course it bothers me. SO this fantastic website comes up with intelligent blood bankers and I got distracted....my question is..is there a genetic link between C and Cw. I always thought that Cw caused a weaker expression of C and now I'm told this is no longer thought to be true?

Sorry that's barely an introduction..I'm Jen by the way

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comment_45252

Hi Jen, welcome to this wonderful site.

RHC and RHc are allelic genes, but RHCw is not allelic to either RHC or RHc.

On the other hand, RHCw is allelic to the much less common RHCx and also to the extremely common RHMAR, which almost everyone has (which is why anti-MAR is sooooooooooo rare).

Having said that, RHC and RHCw tend to be synergistic, and so the C antigen is almost always expressed in the presence of Cw. This is not, however, universal.

If you want to read a little bit more about this, I posted something in the Library section of this site some time ago, entitled Thoughts on Cw and Cx. If you click on Library at the top of the page, then click on Educational Material, you will find it there.

I hope this helps.

:handshake:handshake:handshake:handshake:handshake

comment_45256

Welcome to the site, Jen! (And if you don't want your supervisor to know that you're here, just change your location to Kentucky or New Hampshire!)

comment_45258

Welcome Jen. Here you will very possibly find the answer to most if not all your questions. If we don't know it (I doubt) we can tell you where to find it. Keep up the interest, curiosity and perseverence, never get discouraged. :)

comment_45267

:D

I am a newbie technologist only 4 years and bloodbanking for 2 years in a large hospital (trama 1). I fell into this career in which I love and now terrified my boss is reading this....:). I ran into this website looking up a reference question in which two of my superiors do not agree on and of course it bothers me. SO this fantastic website comes up with intelligent blood bankers and I got distracted....my question is..is there a genetic link between C and Cw. I always thought that Cw caused a weaker expression of C and now I'm told this is no longer thought to be true?

Sorry that's barely an introduction..I'm Jen by the way

I agree this is amazing site for us who are not specialist.

comment_45271
Welcome Jen. Here you will very possibly find the answer to most if not all your questions. If we don't know it (I doubt) we can tell you where to find it. Keep up the interest, curiosity and perseverence, never get discouraged. :)

And if we don't know it, we will make something up that sounds really, really good!:faint:

comment_45272
And if we don't know it, we will make something up that sounds really, really good!:faint:

That's how I lost all credibility with my daughters, by the way. I was so good at telling totally plausible stories that weren't true that they wouldn't believe me when I told them outlandish ones that were true.

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comment_45276

Thank you all so much for your greetings and help. I have gotten my coworker hooked as well because surprising or not surprising we are all newbies on our shift except for three and one of those is only a weekend worker. There are 14 of us.

comment_45291

Hi Jen,

Just remember - if your boss is reading your posts then he or she is likely on this site looking for answers as well - it's a great equalizer! And of course, Welcome!:o

  • 4 weeks later...
comment_45826

Hi Jen -

Welcome to the site, and know that you will learn lots here. Pay attention, even when you are lost. When you find your way, it all will make sense.

Jeanne

comment_45925

Jen makes an interesting point - at my hospital too, the old guard has almost all retired and the new staff have very little experience. In the last 4 years, 14 of my 16-18 member staff (mature, experienced) have been replaced with younger staff with 0-3 yrs experience. I get a lot more off-hour calls now, but it is a lot more "fun" in the lab with the shiny, happy people. :o and they also help point out redundancies and non-value added busy work. My fear is that they may point at a seemingly unnecessary step and ask if it can be removed, and that I will have forgotten over the years why it is that we have always done that, and maybe it was really important, but I can't remember now, and maybe I'll agree to remove it - and find out the hard way why it was there in the first place....

comment_45931

On that same note, I have noticed over the years, if no one remembers why you are doing something and it really dosen't make any sense, you are pretty safe in getting rid of it and moving on.

I've mentioned this before but this is a good time to repeat it. Inertia is the most powerful force in the universe. Once we get moving in a certain direction it can approach the impossible to change the direction no matter how slightly or dramatically we try to change. Besides we fear change, I don't care what anyone says, we really do, and blood bankers more than most. :blahblah: :disbelief

comment_45932
On that same note, I have noticed over the years, if no one remembers why you are doing something and it really dosen't make any sense, you are pretty safe in getting rid of it and moving on.

I've mentioned this before but this is a good time to repeat it. Inertia is the most powerful force in the universe. Once we get moving in a certain direction it can approach the impossible to change the direction no matter how slightly or dramatically we try to change. Besides we fear change, I don't care what anyone says, we really do, and blood bankers more than most. :blahblah: :disbelief

Agree entirely John, but I still think that we should remember (and honour) the past (see another thread about saline and SOPs!!!!!!!!!!).

comment_45952

Excellent point Malcolm. What I was alluding to were primarily internal policies or "adjustments" to procedures and not time honored techniques. An example of that would be when I took over the Transfusion Service at a previous employer they were performing Albumin Enhanced Titers for prenatal antibody work ups. This surprised me so when I started looking into it I discovered that at some point in the past someone thought it would be a good idea since the antibody was found utilizing enhancement media. With a certain amount of effort and large amounts of references as well as support of one gentleman, John Judd, I was able to convince them it was not such a good idea after all. (Yup, I'm a name dropper!)

When ever the response to a question is "We've always done it that way", it certainly requires further investigation. Often times you will discover the rational behind it is valid but when you don't it is time to re-evaluate.

:blahblah: :disbelief again

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