Automated Donor‐Recipient Identification Systems as a Means of Reducing Human Error in Blood Transfusion

Abstract

Clerical and administrative errors are the most common mistakes in blood banking, with errors of sample or patient identification accounting for the majority of mistakes. In an effort to reduce the incidence of human errors, three automated donor-recipient identification systems were developed and were evaluated under clinical conditions. After two years of development and bench testing, each set of equipment was tested, along with established procedures, at a large clinical center, a medium-sized community hospital and a regional donor center. Although none of the systems, as tested, proved acceptable under clinical conditions, a great deal was learned about prototype equipment testing in the clinical setting. Future development of identification systems for clinical use should respond to carefully defined problems, apply in all areas of the hospital or donor center, and be convenient and reliable. The development of the equipment should involve established manufacturers and be subject to exacting preclinical testing.

Transfusion recipient identification

“…In 1977, Sherer et al . described studies performed with prototype systems that were aimed at obtaining a hand‐held bedside automated donor–recipient identification, but none of the systems tested proved fully acceptable under clinical conditions [25]. Since then, a small number of experiences have been reported in the scientific literature, which limits the possibility of comparing the effectiveness of the different technical approaches.…”

Computerization in the Transfusion Service

“…Three different prototyes were used at three different institutions when the specimen was collected, when the blood was crossmatched in the laboratory and at the time of transfusion. They concluded that further development was needed 2 . We now have the technology to do these tasks, but actual implementation of hospital wide systems for patient identification are still uncommon.…”

A Review of Computer Systems in Blood Banks and Discussion of the Applicability of Mathematical Decision Methods

“…The EDP systems mentioned and others which were considered as original contributions to this field are summarized in Table 1. Additional EDP-applications on a more specialized level are outlined in references [1,3,7,9,10,11,12,14,15,18,21,22,25,27,32,43,45,57,61,62,64,68]. Other reviews of computer systems in blood banks can be found in references [50,54,58,63].…”