Earlier this year, a major West Coast medical center had a patient who needed a liver transplant, but there was a major hurdle: The patient had red cell antibodies and the medical center didn’t have the matched blood required. The combination of required antigens (Opos, e-, Jk(b-)) is found in only 0.16% of the population.
“Liver transplants often require transfusions during surgery, and you typically don’t want to go into a transplant surgery like that without at least 10 units of blood available,” Michael Schanen, senior director of Transfusion and Transplantation laboratories at Versiti, explains.
Patients who need a liver transplant have often already undergone many other blood transfusions as part of their treatment, which can cause the patient to make antibodies to red cell antigens. When this occurs matched blood is required for a safe and effective transfusion.
Knowing there was a risk of a massive transfusion reaction if they didn’t find blood that specifically matched this patient, the medical center reached out to the National Blood Exchange, operated by the Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies (AABB). The National Blood Exchange is a nationwide resource-sharing program that coordinates the distribution of blood products.
In response to the medical center’s urgent request, the National Blood Exchange reached out across its facilities, asking if any of them could quickly address this critical need for the patient. Versiti answered the call.
“We’ve genotyped more than 300,000 of our donors across Versiti,” Schanen says. “So, at any given time, 75% of our inventory has a full genotype and we know the complete antigen profiles of these donors. Because we have that information, we can search our computer system and quickly locate all the matched units of blood we have available.”
Once Versiti identified and located the units of blood, staff worked with the Versiti hospital services department and got the units shipped in time for the scheduled surgery. “Because of the blood we provided, this patient was able to undergo a successful liver transplant surgery,” Schanen says.
He also notes that Versiti being able to swiftly respond to requests for specific blood phenotypes in large quantities is what sets it apart from other blood centers. “When it comes to specialty antigen red blood cells, we are the best,” he says. “If someone says they need 10 units of a very specific blood phenotype, and if you don’t have the level of information that Versiti does, you would have to test 6,250 donated units of blood to find those 10 units, a task that would not be achievable.”
This lifesaving collaboration highlights the strength and capabilities of Versiti’s diagnostic laboratories and mission-driven approach. “Versiti is uniquely positioned to be able to respond quickly for that volume and that difficult of a request because of the innovation and investment we have put into genotyping 300,000 of our donors over the years,” Schanen says.