The blood bank at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), the main hospital in the capital, is not prepared to meet any emergency as it is running short of blood and has stored only 50 to 60 blood bags despite having the storage capacity of 2,000 bags.
The condition of the blood bank is deplorable most of its machines are out of order. Moreover, it is running under the supervision of the pathology department of PIMS as the slot of the blood bank head has been vacant far four years. An official, on condition of anonymity, told Pakistan Today, “Mostly patients who need specific blood group fail to get blood from the hospital’s blood bank as they have stored very less blood bags of specific groups.”
The official claimed that blood bank did not have a blood shaking machine. “Earlier, we had three blood-shaking machines, but, suddenly, all have disappeared and nobody knows where they have gone,” he lamented. During a visit to the blood bank, Pakistan Today observed that the door of the refrigerator to freeze plasma was not tightly closed as it was out of order and the weighing machine was also not in working condition.
Dr Hassan Abbas who was the head of the PIMS blood bank four years ago joined National AIDS Control Programme on deputation. After some time, he was transferred to National Blood Transfusion Programme and the blood bank of the PIMS is running without a hematologist head. As there was no one to head the blood bank, the administration, instead of taking some adequate steps, gave its additional charge to the pathology department of the hospital.
Now, unfortunately, the blood bank has a hematologist, Dr Lubna, but she is also serving as the head of Children Pathology Department and it is difficult for one person to handle two departments at one time properly. On the other hand, the blood bank also does not have a qualified medical technologist for blood transfusion services as the medical technologist posted there has been transferred to the burn centre of the PIMS.
In the absence of a hematologist, the blood stored there is going to expire as no mechanism has been devised to use the blood which is nearing expiry date.
