Latest news with #bloodshortage
Forbes
3 days ago
- Health
- Forbes
A Practical Look At How To Solve The Blood Supply Problem
Bob Roda is the President and CEO of Hemosonics. Many people are familiar with food deserts—areas where it is difficult to obtain fresh, healthy food like produce and vegetables—but far fewer are familiar with blood deserts, places where blood supplies are scarce or even sometimes nonexistent. According to a recent article published by Harvard Medical School, "Billions of people live in 'blood deserts,' areas in which the clinical need for blood components cannot be met in at least 75 percent of cases." A blood shortage could prove disastrous in life-threatening cases where a patient needs blood in minutes. Blood deserts aren't just located abroad; numerous rural communities in the U.S. don't have access to crucial blood supplies. Many groups, including the Blood D.E.S.E.R.T. Coalition, have organized to combat the challenge. Hospitals and healthcare organizations, such as the Red Cross, have responded with additional calls for blood donations. While blood donations provide a crucial pipeline for blood supplies, they cannot fix the problem. Emerging technology, hospital culture change and community activism, however, could provide critical help in the short term as experts work on systemic changes to boost blood supply in challenged areas. Experts say it will take decades to recover from the blood shortage in the U.S. alone. Here are four short-term strategies to adopt now to help address blood deserts. 1. Change the culture of thinking around transfusions. Transfusions are a critical life-saving resource, particularly for victims of severe body trauma like industrial accidents and automobile wrecks. However, many have made strong arguments that transfusions are overused. In reality, transfusion is often unnecessary, and patients will do fine with their own blood. There are challenges to this, like longstanding medical practices. But when a transfusion is avoided, blood is saved for a patient who needs it. 2. Embrace patient blood management (PBM). Four years ago, the World Health Organization (WHO) called for healthcare systems worldwide to implement patient blood management (PBM) as a standard of care. The adoption of PBM continues to lag, however, particularly in U.S. hospitals. In short, PBM is a systematic, evidence-based approach that improves patient outcomes by preserving a patient's own blood and promoting safety and empowerment. PBM has three critical tenets: Use the patient's blood, minimize blood loss and improve a patient's anemia tolerance. Patient blood management has been transformative in conserving blood supplies at hospitals worldwide. The only challenge is changing the existing medical culture and protocols around blood use and transfusion. Hospitals should embrace the practice to increase blood supplies. 3. Adopt new technologies. Technological advances and new tools may offer the best chance to help underdeveloped blood deserts in the short term. Chief among them are viscoelastic testing systems. These tests identify whether a patient is at risk for bleeding, the type of blood product they may require and the amount of blood needed. (Full disclosure: My company, HemoSonics, manufactures Quantra, a viscoelastic testing system.) One of the most frequent causes of hospital trauma death is uncontrolled bleeding. However, many of these fatalities are potentially preventable with early, targeted hemostatic intervention. Some technological obstacles include the initial cost of purchasing the technology and training. However, according to the WHO, hospitals that implement viscoelastic testing find they quickly preserve blood, improve patient outcomes, reduce hospital readmissions and reoperations and lower hospital and healthcare facility costs. Other new technologies could also make a difference. Zipline, for example, delivers blood and other critical medical supplies via drones from hospitals and urban areas to blood deserts in Rwanda. There are also 'walking blood banks': new backpack-size kits that contain everything remote medical personnel need to collect and then transfuse blood. Finally, AI and machine learning are also promising: What they do exceedingly well is identify patterns and data and extract crucial findings about blood usage. The findings enable blood banks to allocate resources more effectively and earmark blood donations for underserved areas. AI can also help quickly match a patient with available blood supply, minimizing labor and ensuring patients receive the necessary blood product fast. 4. Utilize mobile blood collection. When blood is collected, it is typically transported to a central site in an urban area for safe storage. Another promising answer to blood deserts is a more targeted use of blood donations. For example, patients in certain areas organize to collect blood for a remote hospital in need. Blood supplies could also be collected and then earmarked for geographic areas where supplies are scarce. Blood donors could also be identified and contacted during a critical regional shortage. The existence of blood deserts is a multilayered social and economic problem that has as much to do with fundamental economic inequities as it does with medical practices. Truly fixing blood deserts will require economic development, improving transportation and supply chains and ensuring an equitable allocation of resources. Nonetheless, the practices above shouldn't be considered just a short-term fix, but rather part of a collective effort to eradicate blood deserts. Combining technology, strategy, activism and public service is a major step in the right direction to conserve blood supplies and address the problem. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
BBC News
11-06-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Shropshire blood donors frustrated by lack of appointments
People in Shropshire have said they are "very frustrated" by a campaign for more blood donors, as they are finding it near-impossible to find somewhere to donate themselves. It comes as the NHS warned it continued to face a "challenging" blood shortage, and called for 200,000 new donors to sign from Wellington is close to donating 100 pints of blood, but said she "just can't see [the milestone] happening" as she cannot find anywhere nearby to donate. NHS Blood and Transplant said it still hosted donation sessions in Shrewsbury and Telford, offering around 5,600 appointments per year. There are 27 permanent donor centres in England, including seven in London alone and two in the West Midlands - Birmingham and NHS's Give Blood website encourages potential donors to book appointments for these Birmingham centre is closed on Sundays, and the Stoke facility does not open at all at the weekend. Some would-be donors from Shropshire, particularly those with full-time jobs, have told the BBC this makes it difficult to donate. 'A bit miffed' "I've been a blood donor for years and years," Ann, who did not want her surname to be used, told BBC Radio Shropshire. She added that she previously donated blood regularly in Shifnal and Telford before sessions were cut. "I just can't get an appointment locally," she said, noting that her last two appointments had been cancelled last-minute. "I feel a bit miffed, basically."Ann added that she felt "a bit annoyed" by the new calls for more donors when regular donors like her were unable to get appointments. Peter Williams, from Waters Upton, recalled the ease of donating blood when he was an apprentice at GKN Sankey in Telford in 1970."The blood wagons used to come round - seven-and-a-half tonne vans they were," he recalled."They'd set up in the ballroom with 50 or 60 beds [...] Hundreds of [workers] must have gone through there each day."Mr Williams noted that he "doesn't know any blood donors" in Shropshire anymore. Jeff Lawrence from Shrewsbury said he was keen to donate blood as "quite a few people have probably helped me in the past, and I'd like to repay the favour.""There aren't many places you're able to give blood, unfortunately."Mr Lawrence said he wants to see more local places made available for donating blood."Less places means less donations, and less donations for people who need it." Tim Dalton, who lives near the Shropshire-Staffordshire border, said the campaign for more donors made him feel "very angry and very frustrated."When trying to book a donation slot, Mr Dalton said "any appointment offered was always in Birmingham or Wolverhampton, but very difficult to get to and always far into the future." Darren Bowen, Assistant Director for Blood Supply Chain at NHS Blood and Transplant, stated that the service "currently [hosts] blood donation sessions in both Shrewsbury and Telford, offering around 5,600 appointments per year."He continued: "We are incredibly grateful to all donors across Shropshire for their unwavering support in ensuring our sessions remain consistently well attended."While our community sessions across the county do get booked up quickly, we are currently appealing for people who live or work near one of our donor centres in towns and cities to help fill these venues where we have greatest availability." Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
The Independent
23-05-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Why the UK is facing a critical blood shortage
The UK faces a critical blood shortage, with O-negative reserves nearing depletion due to recent bank holidays impacting donations. NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) warns of a potential "red alert," the highest warning level, if donations don't increase, which would limit operations to prioritise blood for emergency procedures. Hospitals are down to less than three days' worth of O-negative blood, the universal blood type. NHSBT urges eligible donors, especially those with O blood types, to book appointments immediately. The combination of four bank holidays and half-term within six weeks significantly impacted blood supplies, alongside increased demand for O-type blood due to rising health conditions.
