Chapter 01: MD Anderson’s Blood Bank and Transfusion Services
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Description
Here Dr. Lichtiger describes the scope of work handled by MD Anderson’s Transfusion Medicine Section/Blood Bank. In a practical sense, the Bank handles patients’ specialized needs for platelets, plasma, white blood cells, and other blood elements, delivering, for example, 12,000-15,000 units of platelets per month. The Section also performs all the infectious disease testing for the institution. Dr. Lichtiger also describes how the Service’s clinical staff participate in planning treatment for patients. All requests for blood products are individually reviewed to make sure they are appropriate for a patient, and clinical staff also meets with patients. Dr. Lichtiger asserts that Transfusion Medicine is a “critical element” in patient care, and he believes that the service has earned the respect of MD Anderson clinicians.
Identifier
LichtigerB_01_20120611_C01
Publication Date
6-11-2012
City
Houston, Texas
Interview Session
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD , Oral History Interview, June 11, 2012
Topics Covered
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center - OverviewInstitutional Processes Devices, Drugs, Procedures Institutional Mission and Values The Clinician The Administrator Understanding the Institution Professional Practice The Professional at Work
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Disciplines
History of Science, Technology, and Medicine | Oncology | Oral History
Transcript
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
I’ll record the identifier, and then we can go. I’m Tacey Ann Rosolowski interviewing Dr. Benjamin Lichtiger at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. This interview is being conducted for the Making Cancer History Voices Oral History Project run by the Historical Resources Center at MD Anderson. The interview is taking place in a conference room in the Transfusion Medicine section on the main campus of MD Anderson. Dr. Lichtiger is a specialist in pathology, anatomic pathology, and transfusion medicine. He came to MD Anderson in 1968 as a fellow in the Department of Pathology, and he joined the faculty as an assistant professor in 1974. For many years he directed the section of Transfusion Medicine in MD Anderson’s Blood Bank. When he retired in 2008 he was chair of the Department of Laboratory Medicine. He’s currently serving part time as a clinical professor in the Department of Laboratory Medicine in the Division of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. This is the first of two planned interview sessions, and today is June 11, 2012, and the time is about three minutes of 10:00. Thank you Dr. Lichtiger for devoting your time to this project.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
As I mentioned earlier, I was hoping that we could start with just a really brief overview—a description of the transfusion services at MD Anderson, what they are, what they mean for patient treatment and also for research, if that’s relevant.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
Yes, the MD Anderson Blood Bank comprises two main areas. One is donor operations. We’re responsible for collecting blood and platelets in blood drives as well as in fixed sites, also collecting granulocytes for transfusions for our patients. And with the other component—in that area, the donor operations, they do all the testing, manufacturing. All the units of blood that come in are broken down into a series of components, red cells, platelets, plasma, all prepared for MD Anderson patients. We do not sell or distribute blood products to any other hospital. It’s totally dedicated to serve the needs of our institution. And the transfusion service is responsible for taking those units of blood and cross-matching them and making them available—screen them and test them ready for patients for transfusion and distribute them to the different floors and wards. Our usage of blood components on a daily basis is very high. We transfuse anywhere from 500 to 700 units of random donor platelets a day, about 200 to 300 units of red cells a day, moderate amounts of plasma, and we do not collect all the red products that we transfuse because we would have to collect a lot of blood to really—I’m going to try to implement the word donor collections. We’re not going to invest a lot of effort into that. We buy products from other blood centers. Essentially we buy platelets, and we transfuse close to 12,000 to 15,000 units of platelets per month, so we buy easily about 12,000 units a month from different blood centers to make them available to our institution. We do all the infectious disease testing for the institution, and we have a rapid turnaround time, and from my perspective I think we run a very tight ship. We monitor carefully every request for transfusion. We conduct prospective reviews of every request for transfusion.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
What does that mean?
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
That means that when we get the order, we determine whether it’s indicated or not. In other places, they do retrospective reviews and audits and write a letter to the doctor. You shouldn’t use that. You shouldn’t—no, we do it up front, and we talk to the doctor, to the primary team immediately. Why? And we offer alternatives, or we deny their request as not clinically indicated.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
So you’re very involved really in patient treatment.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
We are very involved. We are trained physicians, and we know the patient. We talk with the patient. In general I would say that through all the years the medical staff has been very gracious to us. They have trusted our clinical criteria and our reasons for approving or not agreeing with their decisions, and we have participated throughout the years in planning the support for the patient population as they need our help. In my humble opinion, I consider that we are a very, very critical element in the way we practice medicine in our institution because most of the therapies that are being given to the patients in one way or another do affect their bone marrow temporarily, so they all end up having to use our services and so we think that we—maybe my colleagues may not agree, but I really think—and my colleagues in blood banking—we think that we have played and will continue to play a pivotal role in any of the new therapies that are being instituted in this organization.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
Thank you. I’m sure we’ll come back to that when we go into more detail.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
Yeah, one thing I need to correct about my background. In 1973 I was named faculty associate. There was a term—pre to getting on the faculty. At that time I was named faculty associate and acting chief of the blood bank because I finished my clinical pathology training, something you didn’t mention. Because once I left the anatomical pathology I never practiced that again, so I actually practiced clinical pathology since then. Right now, correctly, as you said, I’m a clinical professor part time—between quotation marks—because I’m pulling in twelve to sixteen hours a day many days, Saturdays and Sundays included, and I carry the title of Chief of Transfusion Medicine.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
Chief of Transfusion Medicine.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
Yes, ma’am. I wanted to clarify that just for the record.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
Yes, thank you. I should have cleared that with you before I—
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
That’s fine.
Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD :
And I will want to go over your educational background in detail so we have all of those correct. I do have your CV here. I wanted to shift and ask you some general background questions.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
Are you recording now? Tacey Ann Rosolowski, PhD Yes, I am.
Benjamin Lichtiger, MD :
Okay.
Recommended Citation
Lichtiger, Benjamin MD, PhD and Rosolowski, Tacey A. PhD, "Chapter 01: MD Anderson’s Blood Bank and Transfusion Services" (2012). Interview Chapters. 1456.
https://openworks.mdanderson.org/mchv_interviewchapters/1456
Conditions Governing Access
Open
