Dhahan Jasdeep, Morrison Douglas, Shih Andrew W, McDonald Deb, Chen Robby, Hao Lillian, Rosinski Kristin, Buchko Sarah, Blake John, Rutherford Alexander
Department of Mathematics, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada.
Provincial Blood Coordinating Office, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Transfus Med. 2025 Apr;35(2):116-124. doi: 10.1111/tme.13131. Epub 2025 Feb 17.
There is concern about sustaining the O negative blood supply, especially in areas with many rural/remote hospitals like British Columbia. Red blood cells are perishable, making inventory management challenging. Demand must be met without wasting this precious resource. Inventory management challenges stem from data scarcity and human factors. Transfusion medicine technologists, who manage inventory daily, are key to understanding the human factors in inventory management. We conducted a qualitative study to understand technologists' inventory management perspectives and experiences, particularly for group O negative red blood cells, aiming to inform future inventory modelling to address human factors.
We interviewed transfusion laboratory technologists and technical leads from all health authorities and a blood product supplier representative for the Province of British Columbia. Thematic analysis of the interview transcripts was conducted.
We found five themes that influence technologist decision-making on RBC inventory management, key challenges for O-negative RBCs, and identified inventory management strategies. We compare the top three inventory practices from our results with literature.
Our findings help bridge the knowledge gap concerning human factors in RBC inventory management, with potential generalizability to other jurisdictions. They hold promise for informing the safeguarding of donors' altruistic contributions.
人们担心维持O型阴性血的供应，尤其是在像不列颠哥伦比亚这样有许多农村/偏远医院的地区。红细胞容易变质，这给库存管理带来了挑战。必须在不浪费这种宝贵资源的情况下满足需求。库存管理的挑战源于数据稀缺和人为因素。每天管理库存的输血医学技术人员是理解库存管理中人为因素的关键。我们进行了一项定性研究，以了解技术人员对库存管理的看法和经验，特别是关于O型阴性红细胞的，旨在为未来解决人为因素的库存建模提供信息。
我们采访了不列颠哥伦比亚省所有卫生当局的输血实验室技术人员和技术主管以及一家血液制品供应商代表。对访谈记录进行了主题分析。
我们发现了影响技术人员在红细胞库存管理方面决策的五个主题、O型阴性红细胞的关键挑战，并确定了库存管理策略。我们将结果中排名前三的库存做法与文献进行了比较。
我们的研究结果有助于弥合红细胞库存管理中人为因素方面的知识差距，可能适用于其他司法管辖区。它们有望为保护捐赠者的利他贡献提供信息。
