Evaluation of an Automatic Cancellation Program to Reduce Wastage of Blood Components

Choi, Sook Hyang; Kim, Han Gyu; Kim, Kyung Hee; Ahn, Jeong Yeal; Seo, Yiel Hea; Park, Pil Whan

Abstract

BACKGROUND
Ordering an excessive quantity of blood for elective surgery beyond the actual need causes unnecessary cross-matching and wastage or shortage of blood products. To prevent this problem, a maximum surgical blood order schedule (MSBOS) is beneficial. However, the application of a MSBOS is limited due to the complexity of accurate classification based on the name of the operation alone. In this study, we introduced an automatic cancellation program, in which the assigned blood is automatically cancelled after a certain period of time, andevaluated the practicality of a revised MSBOS.
METHODS
We analyzed our hospital data involving transfused RBCs for each elective surgical procedure performed between January and June 2007. The MSBOS was organized based on the average number of units of RBCs transfused for the types of surgeries that had been performed >50 times during a certain period of time. The blood cancellation ratio, blood wastage ratio, and the causes of blood wastage were compared before and after adopting the automatic cancellation program and the revised MSBOS.
RESULTS
After adopting the automatic cancellation program, the blood cancellation ratio decreased from 18.3% to 17.6% and the blood wastage ratio decreased from 2.67% to 2.00%. There was no significant change with respect to the causes of blood wastage before and after adoption of the automatic cancellation program.
CONCLUSION
The implementation of an automatic cancellation program facilitates the efficient use of blood products during elective surgery. It would be useful to apply a revised MSBOS continuously, which is easily applicable and practical in order to decrease the blood wastage rate.