NATO Blood Panel perspectives on changes to military prehospital resuscitation policies: current and future practice.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Blood Panel exists to promote interoperability of transfusion practice between NATO partners. However, it has served as an important forum for the development of prehospital transfusion and transfusion in the austere environment. There are synergies with the trauma hemostasis and oxygen research community especially in the areas of innovation and research. Four presentations are summarized together with a review of some scientific principles. The past decade has already seen significant changes in early transfusion support. Sometimes practice has preceded the evidence and has stretched regulatory and logistic constraints. Ethical and philosophical issues are also important and require us to question "should we" and not just "could we." The challenge for the combined communities is to continue to optimize transfusion support underpinned by evidence-based excellence.
Department of Military Anaesthesia and Critical Care, Royal Centre for Defence Medicine, Birmingham, UK.
Tom
T
Woolley
Commander, Netherlands Military Blood Bank, SBB (ASCP), Consultant in Transfusion Medicine, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
John
J
Badloe
Main Consultant for Hematology and Blood Transfusion, Military Medical Service, Army of Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic.
Milos
M
Bohonek
Director, US Army Blood Program, JBSA Fort Sam Houston, Texas.
Audra L
AL
Taylor
Norwegian Military Medical Service, Oslo, Norway.
Hans
H
Erik Heier
NHS Blood and Transplant, Birmingham, UK and Centre of Defence Pathology, RCDM, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, UK.
Heidi
H
Doughty
D001803:Blood Transfusion / Q000379:methods; D006801:Humans; D008887:Military Medicine / Q000379:methods*; D008889:Military Personnel / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012151:Resuscitation / Q000379:methods*