Advances in pretransfusion infectious disease testing: ensuring the safety of transfusion therapy.
The public expects a zero-tolerance policy for the transmission of infectious agents by blood transfusion. Although unrealistic, the efforts to reach this goal have produced an extremely safe albeit costly blood supply [82]. Blood collecting agencies, the FDA, physicians, and scientists have over the past 20 years created a complex system of layers of protection to interdict transfusion-transmitted infections (Fig. 2). As new, exotic, potentially blood transmittable infectious agents evolve [83], new barriers will be erected to [figure: see text] interdict these agents. In the interim, the US blood supply is the safest in the world.
Downes
Katharine A
KA
American Red Cross Citywide Program, Department of Pathology, Case Western Reserve University, Blood Bank, University Hospitals of Cleveland, Cleveland, OH, USA.
Yomtovian
Roslyn
R
D001771:Blood Banks / Q000592:standards*; D001782:Blood Donors; D001803:Blood Transfusion / Q000592:standards; D017848:Blood-Borne Pathogens; D003140:Communicable Disease Control / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D021821:Communicable Diseases, Emerging / Q000635:transmission; D006801:Humans; D010338:Pathology, Clinical / Q000379:methods*; D012449:Safety; D065227:Transfusion Reaction