AP, T face severe shortage of blood

• Major dearth of negative blood groups seen
  
• Thalassemia patients hit hard, kept waiting
  
• Vacation kept students, the main donors, away
  
• Persistence of heat wave too scaring away people
  
• Kin of patients face severe hardships in securing blood

Hyderabad: With the delayed onset of the monsoon, the scorching summer has dealt another shock that has gone largely unnoticed. There is severe shortage of blood across Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. The reason: Vacation has kept the students, who are the major donors, away. Add to it a prolonged summer is scaring away the people already debilitated by the sweeping heat waves.

Thus, blood donation camps have been rare during the summer, with the result that hospitals and blood bankers have fallen short of blood supplies.
"Blood donations during summer see a substantial 30-40% dip. While rare blood types are very difficult to find, some of the positive groups also finish fast, resulting in shortage," said Dr Harsha Shetty, a medical officer at Chiranjeevi Blood Bank.

Rajahmundry-based Sanjeevini, a voluntary blood donation organisation, hit upon a novel idea and organised blood donation camps at unusual places like marriage functions and memorial services to attract new donors. Dr K Srinivasa Murthy, MD of Dhanwantari Blood Bank, Rajahmundry, “We have a list of donors to cater to the needs of patients in case of emergencies,” he adds.

TTD also encourages pilgrims to donate blood when they visit Tirumala. At the TTD-run Aswini Hospital, the collection of blood through voluntary donation has increased to 1,300 units annually against 400 units two years back. TTD provides darshan through `Supatham’ entry point and also one laddu to the pilgrims who donate blood in Aswini Hospital, TTD medical officer Naveen has said.

Prof Sarella Jothibai of Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences (SVIMS), Tirupati, has called for a vigorous campaign to turn blood donation into a movement.
Unified state of Andhra Pradesh had a minimum requirement of 9 lakh units of blood annually. However, the annual collection never exceeded 7 lakh units a year.
The shortage of blood is proving to be tough particularly for Thalassemia patients who require blood transfusions every three weeks. "If the transfusion is delayed, they end up falling prey to several illnesses," says Rajesh Popli, Secretary, Society for Thalassemics. "We are managing with a lot of adjustments by reducing the number of transfusions due to non-availability of blood," he said, adding that some thalassemic patients were forced to wait for a week more to get their requirement of blood.
Denying scarcity of blood, Dr Madhavi, a Medical Officer, Rajahmundry Government General Hospital, says there are enough blood bags at the hospital to cater to the needs of the patients who come to the hospital.

Referring to the scarcity of rare blood groups, Red Cross Society in-charge of Vijayawada Dr Sodagam Madan Mohan says, “The negative groups are always scarce. We can overcome the problem if there is more awareness among group donors and other public.” Almost all the major blood banks, including Red Cross, Gandhi Hospital Blood Bank, NTR Blood Bank as well as Chiranjeevi Blood Bank, cited non-availability of negative blood groups.

A surgeon at a state-run hospital said that sometimes due to non-availability of negative blood types, surgeries were kept on hold. In Tirupati, SVRR Government General Hospital’s blood bank, which is developed with central funds as `Model Blood Bank,’ is one among the 30 well-equipped blood banks across the country and only one in the state. The salient feature of the blood bank was its `mobile blood bank’ which saw the blood donation becomes easy and accessible to the donors. Model Blood Bank (MBB) director Dr R R Reddy says that the blood bank apart from meeting the requirement of the patients of SVRR Hospital and others on request is also acting as state level training centre for skill development of the personnel working in other blood banks.

One of the private blood banks in Vijayawada, Chaitanya Blood Bank, encourages the kin of the needy to donate to replenish the stock. “In case of scarcity of a particular group, blood will be drawn from one of the patient’s relatives and their demand will be fulfilled to keep the stock intact.”

V Nikhilesh, an engineering student whose father required B Positive blood for a surgery, said, “I tried for suitable blood at my college and friends. I couldn’t find any on an emergency basis. All I had to do was to donate my blood in exchange of the blood I wanted. There is not much difficulty involved in finding blood if you know the right place to get it.”

K Sruthi of Gunadala said that she approached Red Cross for O negative group recently. “After fulfilling their nominal fee and procedures, I was given the blood.”
Dr Raj of King George Hospital (KGH) blood bank, Visakhapatnam, said that usually there would be a slag period for blood donation during April-June due to summer vacation. “With each bag of blood, we can save three lives,” he added.

In Warangal district, the shortage of blood is a common phenomenon all through the year and it turns worse during summer. On an average the district needs about 150 to 160 units per day, of which major units go to Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital (MGMH). There are two major blood banks - Indian Red Cross Society and MGMH - besides three smaller and private blood banks.

The supply situation at Red Cross Society is comfortable now, P Ravinder Rao the chairman of the Society said. Srinivas of Mother Blood Bank has also said that this time the situation was somewhat better in comparison to last season.

The major contributors to the blood banks are the volunteers of National Service Scheme. Kakatiya University NSS programme coordinator B Suresh Lal noted that every year on an average they arrange for more than 17,000 units of blood to the Red Cross Society and MGMH.

Since the whole blood could only be stored for 30 days and its components for three months the NSS has been suggesting to the blood banks to conduct need-based blood donation camps.

For rare groups like ‘AB’ negative, ‘O’ negative and ‘B’ negative the NSS maintained a list of donors with such groups and whenever there was a need the students would be summoned to donate blood, Suresh Lal said.