22 May 2026 (Friday) - UKAS Update

The nice people at UKAS sent their update today. You can read it by clicking here. I always do as I struggle to understand exactly what UKAS actually does, and how what it does is relevant to my daily round.

One thing they do is to charge various employers for their services… and it would seem that some of that money has been spent on buying three hundred and fifty trees which have been planted by UKAS staff who’ve been given a day’s leave to do so.

I’m even more mystified…

22 May 2026 (Friday) - BTLP-TACT Exercise

 

At the beginning of the week I was whinging that it was raining. Today it’s rather hot. But the end result is the same. I’d rather not be outside, so I might as well do a BTLP-TACT exercise.

 

I was presented with one case – a thirty-two year-old woman with sickle cell disease needing a two unit top up transfusion.

 

Her ABO group was indeterminate with reactions in everything, but she was clearly Rh(D) Positive.

The antibody screen was negative.

 

I selected two units of HbS-negative O Rh(D) Negative blood. If nothing else that would stuff up the Rh group next time…

 

I got it right…

21 May 2026 (Thursday) - Transfusion Evidence Library Update

The nice people at the Transfusion Evidence Library sent their update today. As always there was too much to take in at one sitting:

ARTICLE OF THE MONTH

Intravenous ferric carboxymaltose versus oral ferrous sulphate for the treatment of moderate-to-severe postpartum anaemia in Nigerian women (IVON-PP): an open-label, randomised controlled trial.
Afolabi, B.B., et al. (2026). The Lancet. Global Health.
PICO SUMMARY

 

 

TOP ARTICLES

Angio-Seal plug-based versus dual ProGlide for transfemoral hemostasis in transcatheter aortic valve replacement: a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Alnomani, Y.R., et al. (2026). Journal of Thrombosis and Thrombolysis. [Record in progress].

Low-dose vs. standard care Iv human albumin during large-volume paracentesis in patients with liver cirrhosis: a systematic review.
Bot, K., et al. (2026). Liver International.

The efficacy of interactive communication interventions for motivating blood donation: a systematic review.
Boult, L., et al. (2026). Vox Sanguinis. [Record in progress].        

Red blood cell transfusion in neurocritical patients: an updated systematic review and meta-analysis.
Fu, Y., et al. (2026). BMC Anesthesiology.

Effect of donor exclusion criteria on blood safety and volume of donations: a systematic review of modelling studies.
Mosselmans, L., et al. (2026). Bulletin of the World Health Organization.

Blood donation and subjective wellbeing: a cross-sectional survey and a randomized trial.
Ou-Yang, J., et al. (2026). Frontiers in Psychology.

Therapeutic plasma exchange improves short-term survival in patients with acute-on-chronic liver failure: a randomized controlled trial.
Swaroop, S., et al. (2026). Hepatology. [Record in progress].           

The effect of stress ball and music on anxiety, distress, and pain levels during platelet apheresis donation: randomized controlled trial.
Urtekin, D., et al. (2026). Transfusion Medicine Reviews. [Record in progress].

18 May 2026 (Monday) - BTLP-TACT Exercise

I had planned to mow the lawn, but it’s raining… so here we go. I was given one case – an eighty-two year-old chap with PR blood needing group and save.

He grouped as AB Rh(D) Positive with a negative antibody screen.

I got it right.

15 May 2026 (Friday) - Religion (!)

Here’s an interesting post from the nice people at Blood Bytes Beyond. How do you proceed if someone has a religious objection to having a blood transfusion.

I find I have to stop myself and take a deep breath when it comes to deeply held religious views as I used to have them. Back in the day I was a Steward in the Methodist Church. I was one of a committee of four that hired and fired the vicar. And one day I suddenly realized that I didn’t believe a word of the nonsense that I was professing; I just desperately hoped that it was true as the alternative of a godless universe was rather scary.

 

Part of my religious life was a bible study class every Thursday evening in which we would read what appeared to be stark nonsense and try to rationalize it. It clearly says in the Bible that we should abstain from blood (Genesis 9:4; Leviticus 17:10; Deuteronomy 12:23; Acts 15:28, 29) but that means abstain from eating animal blood… which is possibly not a bad thing to do as uncooked animal blood can give you tapeworms. But I doubt very much if anyone writing the Bible all those years ago had blood transfusions in mind.

I’ve had this argument with Jehovah’s Witnesses who’ve come banging on my door. In my experience there are two types of Jehovah’s Witnesses…  

Those who feel that blood transfusions are utterly evil and sinful.

Those whose lives have been saved by them who take great pains to explain that scripture is open to interpretation.

 

And that’s where I fall out with religion. It is all so open to interpretation. Until such time as God leans over a cloud and bellows out instructions it is all guesswork, isn’t it? And the less evidence someone has for a religious standpoint, the more convinced they are that they are right.

 

15 May 2026 (Friday) - Horiba Update

The nice people at Horiba sent their update today. They sent a rather interesting case study… however the case study was rather biased towards people using their blood counters. Which isn’t entirely unreasonable of them, is it?

Keeping abreast of other technologies is never a bad thing though, is it? When I first started in this line of work no one in the UK did a blood count on anything other than a device made by the Coulter corporation. Then the H1 was released. I can remember the rep telling me that he’d been given a target of selling five across the South-East in one year and in a few months he’d shifted seventeen. And then the Sysmex XE came along…

Perhaps Horiba’s day will come. I just wonder if I will see it?

11 May 2026 (Monday) - BTLP-TACT Exercise

 

I’ve got backache and it’s raining. I might as well do a BTLP-TACT exercise, mightn’t I?

It gave me two cases:

 

44156 – a forty-two year-old woman with liver disease and bleeding needing four units of FFP.

The control well failed so the group was uninterpretable.

The antibody screen was negative.

I issued two units of AB FFP as there was only two units there.

 

34387 – an eighty-four year-old chap in A&E also with liver disease just requiring group and save.

He grouped as O Rh(D) Negative with antibody screen positive in wells 1 & 3 so I performed antibody panels.

The enzyme panel was negative throughout.

The IAT panel was positive in cells 1, 3, 4, 6, 8 and 10 corresponding with anti- s but not excluding anti-Kp(a)

 I got the green light.