Knowledge of food and drug administration reportable deviations.

BACKGROUND

As early as 2001, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) required blood centers and hospital transfusion services to report events associated with testing, storage, or distribution of blood products that deviated from current good manufacturing practices or affected the safety, purity, or potency of the product. Between 2004 and 2009, an average of only 8.6% of hospitals reported blood product deviations.

STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS

Case scenarios designed to evaluate knowledge of FDA reportable deviations were developed and sent for evaluation to the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) and FDA division directors for FDA reportable deviations. A final survey containing eight cases was launched in a web-based online survey tool and sent to blood bank medical technologists. Additional information was queried regarding job title/responsibilities and the size of the blood center and/or transfusion service.

RESULTS

There were 176 respondents to the survey. Only 5.7% (10/176) answered all questions correctly. Analysis by job title and place of employment revealed no correlation to the number of correct responses. More importance was attached to deviations involving quality control, blood bank identification, unit specifications, and antibody identification. Less importance was attached to deviations involving phlebotomist's initials, failure to issue units in the computer, and using a recent sample from a previous hospitalization.

CONCLUSION

This study revealed that blood bankers did not have clear understanding of what constituted an FDA reportable occurrence. Size or type of blood establishment or individual job title was not associated with more knowledge of FDA reportable deviations.