Blood bank information systems.

Suzanne Butch, CLDir(NCA), Hal We i n e r, Raymond Aller, MD I with the new and out with a few may be a good way to describe today’s blood bank software market. Some vendors have introduced new or modified software during the past year or so, among them SCC Soft Computer’s new donor system, SoftDonor, and Psyche Systems’ Systematic Blood Bank-Hosted Transfusion System. And a few vendors have sunsetted legacy systems and i n t roduced replacement products, including Mediw a re, which is no longer marketing Hemocare and its LifeLine Blood Bank Data Management System but is now offering HCLL along with its established LifeTrak pro d u c t . The blood bank information systems survey on pages 59–70 provides an overview of blood bank s o f t w a re available in the United States. The information presented was generated from vendors’ answers to a questionnaire. This year C A P T O D A Y has expanded its product profiles to include additional donor system functionality. Wi t h the recent emphasis on homeland security, the ability to rapidly react to a major catastrophe, find app ropriate blood supplies in a community, and re c ruit and schedule donors efficiently has become paramount. Several vendors’ systems now incorporate Web-based re c ruitment and self scheduling, as well as centralized transfusion services. While the following product profiles provide information about general functionality, each facility should write its own detailed specifications for evaluating blood bank systems. Consultants can also help to generate such a checklist based on their knowledge of the marketplace and various vendors’ capabilities. These specifications should be used primarily by facility staff as they re v i e w p roduct characteristics. Loading such a list into a thick request for proposal usually yields a measu re of which salesperson is willing to give unsubstantiated “yes” answers rather than a true pict u re of system functionality. Of importance to many donor centers and some hospital transfusion services are their options for semi-automated and fully automated pretransfusion testing. Many blood banks initially had negative experiences with interfacing fully automated instruments with their information systems. Blood bankers considering automation should talk to their counterparts who have ins t ruments that operate with an interface. A m o n g the most common problem areas are the diff e rences in medical nomenclature between the ins t ruments and the LIS—that is, the definition of reactions, such as a dash versus 0 for negative, 4+ versus 4 for a strong reaction, and transmission of individual test results, such as A n t i A 4+ instead of sending a conclusion such as A POS. Having h a rd-coded definitions in the instrument and the information system could compromise the usability and visual appearance of the test re p o r t s . Blood bankers should also be cognizant of the latest developments in the bedside identification of patients and specimens coupled with the use of b a r-coded specimen labels. Both have been available since the late 1980s but have not been used to their fullest capacity. The Joint Commission on A c c reditation of H e a l t h c a re Organizations has focused extensively on patient identification. This, in part, spurred vendors’ interest in developing software that is integrated with the blood bank information system and used at the patient bedside to verify specimen collection as well as to verify patient and blood component compatibility at the time of transfusion. Some vendors have developed their own, unique applications, while others have partnere d with a third party to develop such applications. Many of these are worthwhile pro d u c t s . Positive identification obviously is also an issue for facilities that modify blood components for transfusion. The blood bankers at such facilities should ask vendors if their systems can pro d u c e labels that comply with the FDA’s Feb. 26, 2004 final rule, “Bar Code Label Requirements for Human Drug Products and Biological Pro d u c t s , ” and if their systems can print Codabar and ISBT 128 blood component labels. The FDA regulation, which applies to all hospitals, re q u i res machine-readable information on blood and blood component container labels to help prevent transfusion errors and accidents. The labels must contain such bar-coded information as unique facility identifier, lot number relating to the donor, product code, and donor’ s blood group and type. Hospitals and other suppliers of blood and blood components conducting business before April 26, which was the eff e c t i v e date of the rule, have until April 26, 2006 to implement the re g u l a t i o n . If you consider automation, bedside identification, and bar-code labeling to be a frill or an extra, keep in mind that you are likely to use the system you purchase today for five to seven years. Don’t discount the importance of these feature s and compromise your ability to detect and pre v e n t e r ro r s . ■