A day at the museum: focusing on transfusion science practice

The National Motorcycle Museum, Birmingham, was the venue for the annual joint meeting of two leading UK blood transfusion organisations, and attracted an impressive audience of some 250 transfusion scientists, practitioners and clinicians. Since joining forces over recent years to host their annual meetings, UK NEQAS BTLP and the BBTS Blood Bank Technology SIG have benefited from shared overheads and higher attendances.

The theme of the day was the current scope of transfusion laboratory practice and the tools required to meet changing demands in informing and coordinating the response to clinical situations in which transfusion knowledge and expertise is invaluable. Three key areas explored over the day were therefore ‘education’, ‘communication’ and ‘empowerment’, which, according to Ann Benton, UK NEQAS Steering Committee, all impact greatly on the transfusion community and the services it provides.

Reducing laboratory errors
The UK Transfusion Laboratory Collaborative, of which UK NEQAS and BBTS are both stakeholders and active participants, released its recommended minimum standards for hospital transfusion laboratories in 2009. Presenting an update and overview on the implications of these recommendations for hospitals, Bill Chaffe, East Kent Hospitals blood transfusion coordinator and Collaborative spokesman, announced that all NHS trust chief executives should have received a copy of the standards and hopefully would be drawing up an action plan to meet them.