The roundtable saw extensive deliberations around the need for a uniform law for blood transfusion services ensuring compliance with internationally accepted safe blood practices like voluntary blood donation, blood screening by NAT, pre-filtered leucocyte-depleted blood and extended cross-matching to name a few
To collect facts and perspectives around safe blood transfusions with a focus on Thalassemia patients in India, Thalassemia Patients Advocacy Group (TPAG) a Thalassemics India initiative, organised a round table meeting recently in collaboration with the ASSOCHAM.
Dr Amita Mahajan, Senior Consultant, Deptt. Of Paediatric Oncology & Hematology, IP Apollo Hospital, New Delhi said, “ASSOCHAM, in collaboration with TPAG, will develop an advocacy paper on the key suggestions regarding safe blood transfusions.”
In the keynote speech, Dr Anil Kumar, Additional Dy. Director General, Directorate General of Health Service, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare said, “About 10,000- 15,000 babies with thalassemia major are born every year in the country. Since 95 per cent of the treatment cost of Thalassemia is out-of-pocket of the patient, the government is putting its best foot forward to ensure the accessibility and affordability of safe blood. The government has introduced the eRaktkosh portal, a blood banking software for data management and integration at the Nation level. This portal has a complete blood bank management system, and it provides live information about bloodstock status, availability of blood/component units, etc. Currently, we have 3,811 blood banks across India registered with the eRaktosh portal. At the same time, the government is already contemplating a national-level program for the prevention and management of Thalassemia. While the guidelines were released in 2016, we need to work more. We believe that with the support of voluntary organisations, we should be able to move in the right direction.”
Speaking at the round table, Anubha Taneja Mukherjee, Member Secretary, TPAG said, “Today, many thalassemics are professionals and taxpayers on account of good management of thalassemia. It would be heart breaking to lose all the hard work by the government by letting thalassemics be exposed to transfusion transmitted infections. It does not even make economic sense to now avoid practices like pre-filtered blood and NAT if you look at the cost of treating these infections.”
Dr Upasana Arora, Co-Chairperson, ASSOCHAM Healthcare Council and Chairperson, Yashoda Super Speciality Hospital said, “It is time to bring about structural reforms in the blood transfusion process by adding an extra layer of protection. A discourse such as this round table would be the first step towards engaging relevant stakeholders to establish a robust policy framework for safe blood transfusion, prioritising patient’s safety and thereby reducing the mortality rate from transfusion-transmitted infections.”
Talking about the current situation of blood banks in India, Dr K Madan Gopal, Sr. Consultant (Health), NITI Aayog said, “India has a large footprint of blood banks, however, there is still a long way to go to meet the adequate number of blood donations. We annually require ten lakh units of safe blood. Moreover, 10-30 per cent of the total number of blood units collected through voluntary donations goes waste because of transfusion-transmitted infections (TTIs). Unfortunately, thalassemia patients are always at a higher chance of getting TTIs because of routine blood transfusion requirements. We need to ensure that the blood we store is fresh and assessed thoroughly for all infections effectively before allowing it for transfusions. We require standardised screening practices to ensure safe blood across the country.”
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