Production of Standardized Labile Products from Single Whole Blood Donations: Evolution throughout Last Three Years

Abstract

Background/Case Studies: Last year this transfusion center collected approximately 108,000 whole blood (WB) donations and 7,000 from apheresis. WB is the raw material for production of labile blood products, necessary to cover the regional transfusion requirements. In 2012, 109,584 red blood concentrates (RBCC), 17,932 plasma units (inactivated by methy-lene blue), 6,515 platelet concentrates from apheresis, and 8,053 buffy-coatderived platelet concentrates (BCPC) were issued to hospitals. All platelet products are inactivated by the INTERCEPT® technology. All labile blood products (LBP) are leukodepleted. It was attempted to provide clinicians with standardized LBP, thus WB collection, blood components production, and preparation are checked and quality control were performed in different phases.Study Design/Methods:Two types of WB bag systems (MacoPharma) are used one, with an integrated filter for WB 1) and the other top and bottom configuration 2) with an integrated filter for leukodepletion of RBCC. In general WB from 1) is filtered and separated after 5-8 hours fromdonation. All WB from 2), more than 60% WB collected, was stored overnightin a temperature controlled room (22±2 C). In the morning (15 to 18 hoursfrom donation) WB is centrifuged at 4497 g for 18 minutes. After, WB isseparated on Compomat G-4 (Fresenius). It was changed to Compomat G-5 last year. In this way, it is possible to obtain RBCC, plasma and buffycoat (BC) with a volume 52±3 ml and a haematocrit of 37±3%, these parameters of BC are critical to pooling BC (5BC) preparation with Orbi Sacsystem (Terumo BCT). Results/Findings: From 2010-2012 the production of blood components from WB only was registered, number of units tested for quality control. The automation offered by some systems during component preparation eliminates the deviation caused by manual operations and increases productivity and yield of the platelet preparation/treatment process. Conclusion: Standardization of WB processing procedure allows the ability to obtain final blood components containing a reproducible quantity of activeprinciples that meet the required standards. The results are consistent and continuous, thus facilitating therapeutic use of blood components and also making it easier to introduce new processes and technologies.