We transfuse most of our blood through an infusion pump, B/Braun outlook. We use NS to prime our y port tubing. Upon completion of the unit of blood we open the saline back up and flush the rest of the blood through. There have been some concerns that aggregate cells will be crushed with this procedure. When we utilize a hotline bloood warmer the total tubing is about 60 ml, which means without flushing it, we would dispose of that much blood. Any thoughts on this process? Thanks
Where is the blood filter located on the Y set? Does the saline infuse through the filter or below it? I am not sure what you mean by crushing aggregate cells. If you are using a standard filter (170 to 260 microns) flushing through this filter could cause cells, clots, etc, smaller than those pore sizes to be flushed into the patient. Flushing below the filter will avoid this and should be done to remove the filtered blood from the tubing. Microaggregate filters are usually not used much anymore except for reinfusion of collected cells during surgery. The other filter is a leukocyte-reduction filter and those are not flushed with saline.
Lynn Hadaway, M.Ed., RN, BC, CRNI
www.hadawayassociates.com
Lynn Hadaway, M.Ed., RN, NPD-BC, CRNI
Lynn Hadaway Associates, Inc.
PO Box 10
Milner, GA 30257
Website http://www.hadawayassociates.com
Office Phone 770-358-7861