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Home Newsroom All in a day’s work for Wollongong Transfusion Laboratory

All in a day’s work for Wollongong Transfusion Laboratory

Media Contact
27th September, 2022

The Aeromedical Retrieval Team has nothing but praise for NSW Health Pathology’s Wollongong Transfusion Laboratory for the vital role they played in providing blood products to a critically injured patient.

When the Aeromed­ical Retrieval team was forced to acti­vate a Retrieval Trans­fu­sion Pro­to­col (RTP) for a trau­ma patient expe­ri­enc­ing mas­sive blood loss, NSW Health Pathology’s Wol­lon­gong trans­fu­sion team sprang into action.

An RTP is used in rare cir­cum­stances when the three red blood cell units on board have been used but the patient needs more.

With immense respon­si­bil­i­ty on their shoul­ders the trans­fu­sion team made sure the cor­rect blood prod­ucts were avail­able and administered.

The para­medics treat­ing the patient at the scene required a fur­ther three units of blood. The trans­fu­sion team coor­di­nat­ed with mem­bers of the NSW Police who picked up the blood prod­ucts and rushed to the scene.

The para­medics con­tin­ued resus­ci­tat­ing the patient when it soon became clear that even more blood prod­ucts were required. They were start­ing to wor­ry, but then they heard the sirens of Police vehi­cles car­ry­ing more units of blood.

As the para­medics urgent­ly trans­port­ed the patient to St George Hos­pi­tal a fur­ther six units were request­ed with two more units wait­ing at the heli­pad, allow­ing a trans­fu­sion to be admin­is­tered on route to theatre.

The patient was even­tu­al­ly sta­bilised despite los­ing more than his total blood volume.

The treat­ing para­medics went out of their way to praise the pathol­o­gy trans­fu­sion team, par­tic­u­lar­ly Eri­ca and Nathan, for their organ­i­sa­tion and effi­cien­cy that played a valu­able role in sav­ing a life.

This event dra­mat­i­cal­ly high­light­ed the impor­tant role the Wol­lon­gong Trans­fu­sion Lab­o­ra­to­ry team plays in deter­min­ing pos­i­tive patient out­comes each day.

While the focus is large­ly on the hero­ic work of our nurs­es, para­medics and doc­tors, it is impor­tant to cel­e­brate the ded­i­cat­ed lab­o­ra­to­ry staff who work mag­ic behind the scenes.

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