Just curious if anyone else has run into this and has some insight.

 

Ortho Gel 0.8% Screening Cells, 3 cell screen. VSS548 Expires 6/25/13. Lot in use as of 5/28/13.

 

We've had half a dozen positive antibody screens that were positive in the 2 cell, w+ through 2+, where the panel was either negative or identified antibodies to low frequency antigens (Cw and Kpa). The first one occurred the day the lot was used.

 

Thanks !

We had a problem with lot VSS547 doing the same thing. When we run into problems like this, we perform a DAT on the cell to see if this is what is causing the problem. If yes, contact ORTHO and they will replace the lot. I can tell you this is the most common cause. Unfortunately, this wasn't the case for VSS547. We ended up tossing our opened vials and replacing with unopened sets. I suspect bacterial contamination.

The main reason I'm curious is with each case the patient has a history of multiple transfusions. I'm wondering if maybe there's a rare antigen on the screen that we usually don't pick up on and someone out there has identified it. Ortho doesn't even test for Jsa anymore.

 

We did a DAT and it was negative - this was also spread out over several different sets and over the course of the last two weeks of use of the reagent so we didn't think it was a contamination issue.

I have expounded at length on the w+ -2+ rxs seen with the Ortho cells.  See previous posts on this topic.