A 5-year cross-sectional retrospective analysis of discard of blood and its components in the blood bank of a tertiary trauma center.

INTRODUCTION: Blood transfusion is an integral part of health-care system and there is no complete suitable substitute for human blood till date. Thus, every unit of blood and its products is precious and should be used judiciously. There is a steady increase in demand for blood and its components and thus to maintain balance between demand and supply, rational use of blood and its components is the need of the hour. This study was conducted to analyze different reasons for discarding blood and its components in a tertiary trauma center so that proper recommendations can be adopted to minimize the discard rate. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A retrospective analytical study was carried out in Sanjay Gandhi Institute of Trauma and Orthopaedics, Bengaluru; a Tertiary Trauma Care Centre for 5 years from January 2015 to December 2019. Details of whole blood collected and blood products prepared were collected from donor register. Reasons for discard were retrieved in detail from discard register. Discard rate for each is calculated as ratio between blood and component collected to the total number of collections and it is expressed as percentage. RESULTS: Out of 22,401 total units of whole blood and its components, 1310 units were discarded accounting for 5.85%. Platelet concentrate (PC) was commonly discarded component (18.3%) followed by whole blood (6.1%), Packed red blood cells (3.64%), and fresh frozen plasma (FFP) (2.92%). The main cause for discarding is expired shelf life (675/1310, 51.53%) followed by transfusion-transmitted infection (12.75%) and suboptimal collection (9.7%). PC was the common component discarded due to the expiry of shelf life (83.21%). FFP was discarded due to damaged blood bags commonly. CONCLUSION: From our observation, we conclude that strict donor selection criteria, predonation counseling, continuous regular training of technical staff involved in blood collection and processing, and adopting newer techniques such as apheresis and first-in and first-out policy will reduce the overall discard rate.