Re: BRITAIN CONSIDERS BANNING PREGNANT WOMEN'S BLOOD
From: art fougner, md (evsono@pipeline.com)
Thu Mar 7 16:13:39 2002
Malcolm - any thoughts?
art
At Thu, 7 Mar 2002, Anna Meenan, MD wrote:
>
>Wow, what would that do to the blood supply? This is just a guess, but
>given the intense fear of invasive procedures (including venipuncture)
>that many males seem to have, I'm guessing that the pool of blood donors
>consists of >50% adult women. That's just a guess, of course. I could
>be wrong. Does anybody know what the gender distribution is at the
>blood bank?
>
>--
> Anna Meenan, MD
>
>At Thu, 7 Mar 2002, Dean Huffman wrote:
>>
>>BRITAIN CONSIDERS BANNING PREGNANT WOMEN'S BLOOD
>>
>>The National Blood Service in the United Kingdom says it's actively considering restrictions on blood donated by women who have been pregnant, because it can trigger a fatal lung condition in the recipient, The London Times reports. Four people are known to have died in Britain in the past four years because they have received blood from donors who are mothers. "Women who have been pregnant produce antibodies to protect themselves from the foreign cells of the fetus, and the levels rise with each pregnancy," says Elizabeth Love, a hematologist. These antibodies can cause a rare condition, Transfusion-Related Acute Lung Injury, in some patients. In fact, there are an average 15 cases a year, Love said. News of the British deaths emerged after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration alerted doctors to be aware of problems caused by the blood condition. According to the FDA, in the past eight years at least 55 people have died from blood donated by women after their second pregnancy. One p
>>ossibility being considered by the British is for blood from women who have had several pregnancies to be used only in low-risk situations, such as transfusions with the plasma removed.
>
--
art fougner, md
ich bin ein New Yorker
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