New Delhi, June 17: In a city that faces perennial shortage of blood for transfusion, a government hospital is disposing of blood as biomedical waste.
The Deen Dayal Upadhaya ( DDU) Hospital in West Delhi wastes over 60 units of blood on an average per month, which can give life to patients of blood disorders such as thalassemia and those suffering accident- related injuries.
Blame it on the poor management of the DDU hospital authorities that allows a major chunk of its blood units to “ expire”. The DDU hospital has the capacity to preserve over 500 units of blood and has facilities to extract life- saving components of blood such as plasma.
Despite having all the facilities in place, the hospital is wasting units of life- saving blood.
On June 14, the hospital disposed of 60 units in a single day.
In March and April respectively, 55 and 41 units were discarded.
The expired blood is sent to incinerators for disposal along with other biomedical waste at the DDU Hospital.
“ The blood bank often has more than required blood. It can’t be used so it gets expired,” Dr K. N. Pandey, in- charge of the blood bank, said. Sources said the hospital has over 80 to 90 units of expired blood to be disposed of.
The medical superintendent of the hospital, Dr Jiledar Singh, however, said he was not aware of the wastage. “ I will look into the matter. I have called the blood bank in- charge for further information.
There is a mistake on hospital’s part, if this is true,” Singh said.
According to the government policy, a hospital, if it has enough blood or the date of expiry of blood is near, should pass it on to other blood banks and hospitals that need them.
“ It shows the poor management of the hospital, they should
pass it on to other government hospitals such as the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, G. B. Pant Hospital and Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital, which generally run short of blood,” Dr Bharat Singh, director, state blood transfusion council, said.
“ The hospital can even give it away to licensed private blood banks for proper usage,” he added. There are at least 56 blood banks in the Capital out of which 17 are government owned.
The Capital and the National Capital Region need over four lakh units of blood every month.
Three lakh units of blood can be procured through blood donations.
“ There are more than 2,000 children in Delhi and NCR suffering from thalassemia, who need blood transfusion every two to four weeks. There is a general shortage of blood in blood banks for such patients,” Dr J. S. Arora, general- secretary of National Thalassemia Welfare Society and Federation of Indian Thalassemics, said.
“ Patients run from pillar to post for blood donors. There is a shortage of blood many times over. All blood banks of hospitals are interconnected so one can transfer blood to other hospitals if in surplus,” an AIIMS official said.
Even though the DDU hospital is at fault, no formal action can be taken against it. “ The hospital can only be given warning for improving its management,” Dr Bharat Singh said.
—Agencies