Changes in red-cell transfusion practice in a tertiary care hospital during the 1990s - a 7-year study

Use of red cells for transfusion in a tertiary care hospital has been studied over a 7‐year period from 1990–1991 to 1996–1997. In this time, red‐cell use has declined by 18% while new patients or admissions to programmes in oncology, trauma or cardiac bypass surgery have increased by 57%, 66% and 7...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Transfusion medicine (Oxford, England) England), 1998-09, Vol.8 (3), p.179-184
Main Authors: Pinkerton, P H, Tasev, T, Coovadia, A S
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Arthroplasty, Replacement, Hip - statistics & numerical data
Arthroplasty, Replacement, Knee - statistics & numerical data
Blood Banks - utilization
Canada
changes
Coronary Artery Bypass - statistics & numerical data
Erythrocyte Transfusion - trends
Erythrocyte Transfusion - utilization
Health Care Surveys
hospital
Humans
Hysterectomy - statistics & numerical data
Practice Patterns, Physicians' - statistics & numerical data
Practice Patterns, Physicians' - trends
Prostatectomy - statistics & numerical data
red cell
Surgery Department, Hospital - statistics & numerical data
utilization
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Summary:Use of red cells for transfusion in a tertiary care hospital has been studied over a 7‐year period from 1990–1991 to 1996–1997. In this time, red‐cell use has declined by 18% while new patients or admissions to programmes in oncology, trauma or cardiac bypass surgery have increased by 57%, 66% and 73%, respectively. This reduction in red‐cell transfusion has been achieved by a combination of less patients (proportionately) receiving red cells and less red cells being transfused to individual recipients. When the trends are analysed for red‐cell use in four elective surgical procedures there is a significant reduction in both the proportion of patients transfused and the mean number of units used per patient undergoing the procedure. Autologous presurgical blood deposit met about 45% of the blood requirement for those four procedures. A similar decreasing trend in units per patient and proportion of patients transfused red cells was seen for ‘first‐time’ coronary artery bypass surgery. The question arises as to how far this trend may go before adverse effects of undertransfusion become apparent.
ISSN:0958-7578
1365-3148
DOI:10.1046/j.1365-3148.1998.00158.x