HAVE YOU SEEN THIS INFORMATION ON BLOOD PRODUCTS?

[Beaaware]

According to SABTO ( Safety Of Blood Tissues & Organs) who advise the government on public health including vCJD (human form of mad cow disease) the following text was added to the labels of all UK blood components on 1st July 2007:

"RISK OF ADVERSE REACTION/INFECTION, INCLUDING vCJD"

I worry that we are not being given this information when we go to hospital for operations, transfusions etc.
Even today people are being told by letter that they may have been exposed to vCJD through contaminated instruments during their operations. The government continue to bury their head in the sand and make out that vCJD is not an ongoing and significant threat to every family in the UK.

Thank goodness for websites such as justiceforandy.com.

Just to say, in my NHS trust at least, if a patient undergoes or is to undergo surgery and is suspected of vCJD, disposables are used during surgery and if this is not possible all instruments used in the case are quarantined. The risk of vCJD should not deter people from life saving treatments.

But shouldn't there be a precautionary approach? The incidence of vCJD is completely unknown. Who on earth would be suspected of vCJD?

Some people are suspected of the disease, although I'm not sure on which criteria. In my experience, this has been the procedure when such patients need to undergo surgery.

I may be wrong and apologies if I am, but I think the criteria for checking whether someone is at higher risk of vCJD is to do whether they have recieved more than 80 transfusions of blood products and the time frame in which they received them.

Rather proves the point, then...

GeraldineAubergine, I understand that some operations recycle a patients blood, is this a precautionary measure so that a patient does not come into contact with donor blood? Also am I correct in saying that it is impossible to identify who is carrier of vCJD? Is there a website for the public to access where we can read the current guidelines on this?

DBennett, thankyou for the information I have subscribed to the Contaminated Blood Bill 2010-11, this is very helpful. With regards to compensation I am aware that relatives are offered a substantial lump sum for the loss of a loved one and there are restrictions attached to the acceptance of the money, the restrictions may explain why they are treated as special cases.

@Beaaware

Do you mean preoperative autologous donation (where a patient donates their blood in advance of an operation)?

Or intra-operative autologous blood salvage (where a individuals blood products are collected during a procedure to be reused)?

These techniques, part of bloodless surgery protocols have been developed in a response partly to cultural barriers to standard transfusion practice and to increased cost of blood.

I'm not aware of any patient orientated information but you can read the advice aimed at British haematologists here.

I would question that vCJD is a relatively significant risk to every family in the UK.

However, I was also pressured to have a transfusion which I said no to - and I didn't need it either.

But couldn't you, for example, offer your own blood for your dc if it matched? Or get dp, dgrandparents etc to provide it? Assuming there would be time of course, if not urgent.

It's done with kidneys, isn't it?

You know what? I don't want to know the risk. If I needed a blood transfusion I need it. Better than dying immediately, IMO.

mrsdarling, if there was time, I would want a siblings blood. How often is there time, though?

Feel free to refuse blood products if you want to avoid the risk. But this thread is crazy scaremongering.

The blood transfusion service does all it can to minimise the risk of infection by choosing who can donate carefully. But there's not a lot else they can do.

Interestingly, other countries won't accept donations from people who have lived in the UK because of the risk of CJD.

But again - rather proves the point, surely?

In fact, if there were time, I'd have my own blood.

The point is that everything possible is done to minimise patients contracting vCJD and if you are unwell enough to need a transfusion then surely the tiny risk posed shouldn't be your major concern, I say this as someone who's had eight units of blood.

DBennett, I know someone who recently had an operation whereby the blood loss was put back during or after the operation, sorry I don't know what the medical term of this procedure is.
GeraldineAubergine, I am sure the NHS do everything possible to minimise patients contracting vCJD, but I read this quote today from SABTO which I think you may find interesting " There could be 6,000 infectious doses of vCJD in one blood transfusion, the numbers at risk are clear and its a significant risk & concern to SABTO" this was Professor Mark Turner from SABTO talking about vCJD & the risk to our blood transfusion service.
What is reassuring to read thanks to DBennett's link is that there is currently a contaminated blood bill going through parliament which should hopefully give the green light to filter all blood for transfusions.

can i ask if you are a JW? if so this thread would make sense.

@Beaaware

Sounds like intra-operative autologous blood salvage (where a individuals blood products are collected during a procedure to be reused?.

Hasn't found much use beyond major orthopaedic procedures yet but as technology improves it will become more widespread.

and what about those who have had blood transfusions.

DS had one when he had meningitis, 15 years ago. so apart from being eternally damned what else do we have to contend with. oh this i see thanks for that. not.

i suspect the op is a JW.

Beaaware, as DBennett says, the type of blood collection you talk about is often used in surgeries where a large volume of blood may be lost, e.g. cardiac, hepato billiary ( I see it used in liver transplantation fairly regularly), vascular and major orthopaedic surgery.
It can also be used to allow people with a cultural opposition to transfusion, i.e Jehovahs witnesses, to have vital blood replacement,as well as people who have rare blood types.
'cell saving' technology will become more frequently used now as the pool of blood donors in the UK is reduced due to the strategies and safety measures in place to reduce blood born infection by blood donation.

GeraldineAubergine, as you work in a hospital do you think it would be a good thing for the general public to have an informed choice on safe blood or is the information I have quoted from SABTO best kept out of the public domain?

There is already information available to the public about safety of blood transfusions, foe example here.

In what way do you feel it is inadequate?

For those interested in obtaining more info on the risk of vCJD thru blood transfusion and P-Capt filter which has been recommended by SaBTO, please go to the following presentation made by Dr. Robert Rohwer at a recent Patient Safety 2010 Conference in London.

www.prometic.com/en/docs/misc/UKPatientSupportMeeting-RGRManagingtherisksfromvCJD2-4-2010v8.pdf

It is clear that there is a risk of getting vCJD via blood transfusion in the UK. At present there is no screening test and the company (Amorfix) which was furthest advanced in developing such a test has dropped this program because of the difficulties involved.

Also, the DoH is still deliberating on the SaBTO recommendation (October 2009)to adopt the prion reduction filters for those born after 1996. It is awaiting the results of the PRISM study which has taken over 3 years to complete. Universal adoption could be linked to efficiencies being made in the NHS in order to pay for the implementation of this device.

Adoption of the Contaminated Blood Bill would result in universal adoption of the filters. This is a Private Members Bill so the chances of it being adopted are probably quite low.

My own personal opinion is that there is a risk of getting vCJD thru blood products.And, I would like to have filtered blood in the event that I need a medical procedure requiring a blood transfusion, even if I have to pay for the filter devices myself.