Transfusion Medicine

Introduction to the Department of Transfusion Medicine The Department of Transfusion Medicine of the First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University was separated from the Department of Laboratory Medicine in 1982 and established as a department—the Blood Bank—and was renamed the Department of Transfusion Medicine in 1997. It has now developed from a blood bank with a single function into a comprehensive department integrating blood storage and supply, transfusion testing, transfusion therapy, and clinical, teaching, and research functions. It currently has more than 1,500 square meters of operational space.

Department Features Laboratory Testing: A transfusion compatibility laboratory (difficult blood grouping/crossmatching, blood group genetics, unexpected antibody screening and identification, etc.) and an infectious disease screening laboratory (AIDS screening/confirmation, screening for transfusion-transmitted diseases before transfusion, etc.) have been established. In addition to routine testing items, platelet antibody testing, platelet crossmatching, testing for five Rh antigens, thromboelastography, and other services are also provided, offering more comprehensive and reliable laboratory evidence for clinical testing and blood use.

Transfusion Therapy: Around the clock, the department provides clinical services including therapeutic plasma exchange, lymphoplasmapheresis, whole-blood/half-volume blood exchange, red blood cell apheresis removal, platelet apheresis removal, autologous transfusion (storage autologous red blood cell apheresis, storage autologous platelet apheresis, storage autologous whole-blood collection), PRP therapy, and clinical consultation. Transfusion clinics have been established at both the Yuanjiagang Campus and the Jinshan Campus to provide patients with diagnosis and treatment services.

Clinical Blood Use: In accordance with laws and regulations, a comprehensive clinical blood-use system and a long-term regulatory mechanism for rational blood use have been established. Transfusion informatization is used to conduct whole-process, intelligent closed-loop management of clinical blood-use procedures, including clinical physicians’ indications for blood use and efficacy evaluation, thereby achieving scientific, rational, safe, and effective blood use. The department is now a regional center and sentinel unit for national blood safety monitoring.

Teaching and Research The department focuses on the comprehensive development of medicine, education, and research, and offers the elective course Clinical Blood Use to five-year clinical medicine students and clinically oriented postgraduate students. Since 2013, it has enrolled targeted interns and visiting trainees in transfusion medicine from laboratory medicine programs, training multiple transfusion medicine professionals every year for blood collection and supply institutions and medical institutions, and has been rated an “Excellent Internship Base” by Chongqing Medical University. It has organized multiple national- and municipal-level continuing education programs, participated in compiling the second edition of the top transfusion medicine work Chinese Transfusion Medicine and multiple expert consensuses. In recent years, there have been 26 national-level, provincial/ministerial-level, department/bureau-level, and collaborative projects, including 5 funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China; 21 SCI papers have been published, with a maximum IF of 12.545.

Talent Structure There are currently 33 employees, including 3 clinical physicians; 6 with senior professional titles and 11 with intermediate professional titles; 10 with doctoral degrees (including 1 postdoctoral fellow currently at a postdoctoral station and 2 who returned after studying in Chicago); and 5 master’s supervisors. In addition to the Yuanjiagang Campus, 3 staff members are permanently stationed at the Jinshan Campus and 3 at the Jingwei Campus.

Quality Management As one of the first in the industry, the department prepared quality management documents, including the Transfusion Management Quality Manual and standard operating procedures for the transfusion laboratory, in accordance with the ISO9000 model. It conducts internal quality control of transfusion compatibility testing and has established a quality management system for the Department of Transfusion Medicine, providing strong assurance for safe transfusion.

The department has consistently followed the quality policy of “Excellent Techniques, Accurate Results, and High-Quality Services,” continuously making efforts and innovating, and striving to build itself into a department at an advanced international and domestic level.

Specialty Alliance In March 2018, with the Department of Transfusion Medicine of the First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University as the chairing institution, the Chongqing Transfusion Medicine Specialty Alliance was established under its leadership. It now has 124 alliance member institutions, covering surrounding provinces and municipalities including Chongqing, Sichuan, Guizhou, Xinjiang, and Tibet. Based on the principles of resource sharing, complementary advantages, win-win cooperation, equality, and mutual benefit, and with the purpose of “accelerating the development of transfusion medicine departments and the training of transfusion medicine professionals, and improving the level of clinical blood use,” the alliance has built a platform for learning, exchange, and cooperation in transfusion medicine. It has always adhered to the principles of public welfare and non-profit operation, promoted the sharing and orderly flow of transfusion medical resources among multiple parties, and improved the overall service level of transfusion medicine.

The alliance organizes academic activities every year. It has organized multiple sessions of training courses on rational clinical blood use and new transfusion medicine technologies, transfusion physician training courses, rational clinical blood-use training courses for clinical physicians, as well as thematic exchange meetings and national- and municipal-level continuing education programs on “Monitoring of Adverse Events in Clinical Transfusion,” “Case Analysis of Standardized Documentation of Clinical Blood-Use Medical Records,” “Discipline Development in Transfusion Medicine,” “Multidisciplinary Clinical Application Training Course on Transfusion Therapy,” and “Research Capacity Workshop for Chongqing Transfusion Medicine Personnel.” Face-to-face communication and exchanges are organized to strengthen cohesion among alliance member institutions and promote industry development. More than 40 technical and research collaborations have been conducted among alliance member institutions, with 5 papers jointly written; targeted interns and visiting trainees in transfusion medicine continue to be trained. Multiple alliance member institutions have been enabled to newly launch transfusion technologies and transfusion clinics such as autologous transfusion, plasma exchange, and PRP, meeting the standards of the Basic Standards for Departments of Transfusion Medicine in Chongqing Medical Institutions (Trial); practical problems encountered in work have been resolved, experience has been mutually learned and shared, and resource sharing has been achieved.