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December's TraQ newsletter includes these highlights:

International news

General

• Delay in ordering blood resulted in death and $9 million award - Court of Appeals Verdict (Fascinating case of interest to physicians, nurses, medical technologists)
• AABB Standards open for comment to 28 Dec. 2012: 
  • Proposed 8th ed. of Standards for Immunohematology Reference Laboratories
  • Proposed 2nd ed. of Standards for Molecular Testing for Red Cell, Platelet, and Neutrophil Antigens

Canada

• Héma-Québec to run more cultures after quarantine of 70% of blood supply over blood bag leaks
• CBS move to amend blood donation rules over MSM doesn’t go far enough, says thwarted donor

Australia / NZ

• Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia launches fun social media campaign to encourage viewers to imagine a "World Without Pathologists"
• 30 years of HIV - Rates increase amid new hope for a cure
• Safer transfusions hope for babies found by University of Adelaide researchers
• Patient Blood Management Guidelines (Nov. 2012 progress update)

Bulgaria

• Understaffed and underpaid blood centre staff decide to stay on

Ireland

• IBTS postpones full implementation of EU Blood Directive after Hb standard leads to more deferrals
• Outgoing chair warns Health Minister that not filling IBTS board vacancies creates “unacceptable risk”

UK

• Royal Bournemouth Hospital joins NHSBT pilot of electronic tracking systems to monitor blood stocks
• More nurses using twitter
• Scotland: New £36.4m blood testing centre given green light

USA

• Homicide rates fall despite soaring gun violence, partly due to advances in blood transfusion practices
• TM RFID Consortium finds RFID improves efficiency of blood supply chain, seeks FDA 510(k) clearance
• Also see General above

Industry news

• Immucor launches Lab Education And Resource Network (LEARN)

Diseases in the news

• HIV: Archives of San Francisco Chronicle from 3 Dec. 1987

Resource library

• Resources from BC PBCO, inc. transfusion reaction webinars
• New TM blog: Here comes the sun (Musings on putting fun back into transfusion medicine)

Journals

• Eclectic articles, including one on informed consent and another on the impact of a shorter shelf life for RBC.

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December 11, 2012
Pat Letendre, TraQ coordinator

TraQ Newsletter - December 2012

INDEX

TraQ & BC PBCO | Global News | Diseases | Industry News | Resource Library - Links | Journals

• TraQ home | BC PBCO

For the latest news see What's new - chronological

General

• Delay in ordering blood resulted in death & $9 million - Court of Appeals Verdict
  • Fascinating case of interest to physicians, nurses, medical technologists about delay in ordering blood, inc. physician opting to wait for crossmatched units. Legal tidbits:
  • “Degree of reprehensibility of the defendant’s misconduct,” is the “most important indicium of the reasonableness of a punitive damages award”
  • US Supreme Court set 5 factors for determining reprehensibility of a defendant’s misconduct (Read verdict to discover them)
• Leukemia patients remain in remission more than 2 years after receiving genetically engineered T cell therapy (UPenn news release, 9 Dec. 2012) | Related news item (11 Dec. 2012)
• AABB Standards (Comments to 28 Dec. 2012)
  • Proposed 8th ed. of Standards for Immunohematology Reference Laboratories
  • Proposed 2nd ed. of Standards for Molecular Testing for Red Cell, Platelet, and Neutrophil Antigens

Canada

• Héma-Québec to run more cultures on quarantined blood (5 Dec. 2012) Leaky bags are from Haemonetics, which has no comment to date
  • Héma-Québec' quarantines 70% of blood supply over blood bag leaks (29 Nov. 2012) | Surgery cancelled | H-Q notice
• CBS move to amend blood donation rules over MSM doesn’t go far enough, says thwarted donor (26 Nov. 2012)

Australia / NZ

• Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia launches fun social media campaign to encourage viewers to imagine a "World Without Pathologists" (28 Nov. 2012) | World without Pathologists (website)
• 30 years of HIV - Rates increase amid new hope for a cure (1 Dec. 2012) (HIV increased 8% last year, 50% over past decade)
• Safer transfusions hope for babies found by University of Adelaide researchers (22 Nov. 2012) (2-yr trial of washed RBC)
• NBA: Patient Blood Management Guidelines (Nov. 2012 progress update)

Bulgaria

• Understaffed and underpaid blood centre staff decide to stay on (14 Nov. 2012)

Ireland

• IBTS postpones full implementation of EU Blood Directive (14 Nov. 2012) Hb standard led to significant increase in deferrals
• Outgoing chair warns Health Minister that failure to fill ISBT board vacancies creates “unacceptable risk” (27 Nov. 2012)

UK

• Royal Bournemouth Hospital joins NHS Blood and Transplant pilot of electronic tracking systems to monitor blood stocks (16 Nov. 2012)
• More nurses using twitter | Also see Twitter chats for nurses
• Scotland: New £36.4m blood testing centre given green light (18 Nov. 2012)

USA

• Homicide rates fall despite soaring gun violence (8 Dec. 2012) Interesting analysis of advances leading to better survival, inc. transfusion practices
• TM RFID Consortium finds RFID improves efficiency of blood supply chain, seeks FDA 510(k) clearance (20 Nov. 2012)
• Also see General above

• Immucor launches Lab Education And Resource Network (LEARN) For customers only | Immucor Login

* Also see TraQ's Industry News

Diseases in the news

• HIV: Archives of San Francisco Chronicle from 3 Dec. 1987

* Also see TraQ's 'Disease clearinghouses' in top menu

Resource Library / Links

Canada - BC PBCO

• Transfusion Reaction Education for BC Pathologists - Webinars (Inc. slides & Q&A section)
• Transfusion Bits and Bytes (6 educational videos for med lab technologists)

New TM blog: Here comes the sun (Musings on putting fun back into transfusion medicine)

*See TraQ's Resource Library | Nursing resources | Literature clearinghouses | Links | Continuing education | Jobs | Video library

Free full text | (* 1 or more Canadian authors)

• * Blake JT, Hardy M, Delage G, Myhal G. Déjà-vu all over again: using simulation to evaluate the impact of shorter shelf life for red blood cells at Héma-Québec. Transfusion. 2012 Nov 12. [Epub ahead of print]
• Franklin IM. Blood transfusion safety: a new philosophy. Transfus Med 2012 Dec; 22(6): 377­-82.
• Friedman M, Arja W, Batra R, Daniel S, Hoehn D, Paniz AM, et al. Informed consent for blood transfusion: what do medicine residents tell? What do patients understand? Am J Clin Pathol. 2012 Oct;138(4):559-65.
  • Full free text article
• Learoyd P. The history of blood transfusion prior to the 20th century­ part 2. Transfus Med 2012 Dec; 22(6): 372-­6.
• *O'Brien SF, Scalia V, Goldman M, Fan W, Yi QL, Dines IR, Huang M, Ndao M, Fearon MA. Selective testing for Trypanosoma cruzi: the first year after implementation at Canadian Blood Services. Transfusion. 2012 Nov 12. [Epub ahead of print]