RML Outsources Testing of Blood Units

RML Outsources Testing of Blood Units 

Decision Follows Report Of Lapses At Hosp; Lady Hardinge To Handle Screening For Now 

Anuja.Jaiswal@timesofindia.com 

New Delhi : Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital has begun sending blood units collected at its blood bank to Lady Hardinge Medical College for nucleic acid testing (NAT) from Monday. This follows the TOI report of Aug 30 on RML supplying blood without this advanced screening. LHMC officials confirmed they started receiving blood on Sept 13 and have tested 203 units so far — 60 on Sept 13, 59 on Sept 15 and 84 on Sept 16. “It’s correct that RML is sending blood units to LHMC for testing till a NAT machine is pro cured by the hospital,” confirmed Dr Pulin Kumar Gupta who is in charge of RML’s media cell. “This step was taken for the betterment of patients. The procurement of the machine will be fast-tracked within a month.” NAT is considered an additional layer of protection in blood banking. It ensures that donated blood is screened for viruses even during the “window period” when traditional antibody-based tests may fail to pick up an infection. 

It is globally recognised as a superior method of ensuring transfusion safety. According to hospital sources, RML’s lapse began in Nov last year after its semi-automatic NAT machine became non-functional. Since then, only routine serology tests such as the 4th generation ELISA test have been used. While ELISA detects antibodies to HIV and hepatitis viruses, it does not match NAT’s early-detection capability. A senior doctor summed it up: “From a purely safety and technical point of view, ID-NAT (individual donornucleic acid testing) is clearly superior: it catches earlier infections, reduces residual risk, and picks up occult infections.” 

 The National Blood Transfusion Council recommends NAT as the most reliable standard for blood safety, though it is not mandatory across India because of cost considerations. Observers say large tertiary hospitals with high patient loads are nonetheless expected to maintain NAT facilities. International bodies such as the US FDA and the American Association of Blood Banks also recommend NAT for donor screening. Meanwhile, the Thalassemia Patients Advocacy Group has written to Union health minister JP Nadda, seeking immediate intervention in the matter. In the letter, the group’s member-secretary Anubha Taneja Mukherjee called the discontinuation of NAT-screened blood at RML “shocking” and warned that this put lives at risk. She pointed out that while hospitals such as LHMC and Deen Dayal Upadhyay were moving from ELISA IV to NAT, RML had gone backwards by ceasing NAT, according to patients’ accounts. Mukherjee stressed that for the more than five lakh thalassemia patients in India who depend on fortnightly transfusions for survival, the availability of NAT-tested blood is a necessity, not a luxury.