Vol. 6, Issue 2, Part A (2024)

Introduction: Blood transfusion is an essential procedure that replaces blood loss to injury or surgery, it can also help treat certain medical conditions. There are many obstacles and malpractice that affect the transfusion.
Objective: To evaluate the practice of blood transfusion at Al-Kut city hospitals.
Materials and Methods: Cross-sectional hospital-based study targeted a convenience sample of patients who have blood transfusion attended to Al-Karama teaching hospital and Al-Zahraa teaching hospital and al kut teaching hospital, the study was carried out in 98 patients collected from people for a period of 6 months, Data was collected using questionnaire consisting of 14 questions.
Results: This study included Ninety-eight (98) patients having blood transfusion. Forty-three (43.9%) of the patients were less than 18 years of age. The transfusions done mostly at the morning call for (66.3%) of patients. Decisions of transfusion mainly were made by the senior doctor for (96.9%) of patients. The blood transfusion was highest in medical departments (22.4 %), followed by pediatric departments and Genetic blood diseases center (18.4%) for each of them. The most frequent blood groups were group A in 31 of patients (28 Rh+ and 3 Rh-) and group O in 31 of them (29 Rh+ and 2 Rh-). Beta thalassemia major was the most frequent diagnosis presented in (17.3%) of patients, the second most frequent diagnosis was chronic kidney disease (CKD) for (13.3%) of patients. Most of the transfusions were Packed Red Blood Cells (PRBC) transfusions for (76.5%) of patients followed by Fresh frozen Plasma (FFP) for (12.2%) patients. The duration of transfusion lasted less than 2 hours for (55.1%) of patients. The hemoglobin level were > 7 g/dl for 37 (44.57%) of PRBC and Whole blood transfusions patients, the mean was 7.191 and the minimum and maximum were 2.9 and 12.3 respectively. Fifty-nine (71%) of PRBC and whole blood transfusions were warmed. Fifty (60.2%) of patients with PRBC and whole blood transfusions received 1 unit only. The immediate complications occurred in (22.4%) of the patients, and mostly fever and skin rash.
Conclusion: The study demonstrated inappropriate use of blood transfusion, that’s make it not comply with the current international guidelines.