Blood service ‘envy of world’
New Zealand may punch above its weight when it comes to its blood donation service but that doesn’t mean there’s no room for improvement.
Just 4 per cent of people eligible to donate blood do so – a statistic that the New Zealand Blood Service (NZBS) is keen to change as it marks its 20th anniversary this year.
Christine Van Tilburg, the service’s director of business improvement and partnerships, said although demand for blood and blood products had remained static, it was important to look beyond the present.
‘‘We have an ageing population so we need to collect more than 3000 donations a week just to maintain our stock and meet demand.’’
Van Tilburg started with the service before its official inception in 1998, having previously worked for the Auckland Regional Blood Service.
In 1996, the Ministry of Health undertook a review of blood services in New Zealand.
This resulted in the landmark Carter-Marshall report, which indicated a need for change but did not provide a specific blueprint for a national service.
Fast-forward two years and the NZBS was created. It was then appointed as the Crown entity responsible for the national provision of all blood services and blood products.
After some time, it eventually became a selfsustaining model agency that many international blood services have sought to emulate.
‘‘We’re cautious early adopters. We constantly monitor international trends but we use evidence-based decision-making to make the changes and keep us up to date with best practice,’’ Van Tilburg said.
‘‘We punch above our weight as far as organisations [go].’’
The service once relied on ‘‘snail mail’’ and telephone communication to keep in touch with donors but these days things move a lot quicker.
‘‘Technology has been an amazing enabler for us. In the early days, when internet was a distant dream, communication was quite fragmented but now we are able to reach out [to donors] so much easier.’’
The organisation has a smartphone application that alerts donors when their blood is used to save a life.
Last week, the service put out the call for O negative blood, a rare event due to an ‘‘extraordinary’’ number of patients requiring the blood type. The response from eligible donors was swift.
‘‘That was an unusual circumstance but it does happen. We had an extremely high demand for O negative in a short period of time.
‘‘We had some very, very sick patients.’’
Stock levels are now back to normal but demand for different products, other than ‘‘the red stuff’’, is increasing.
‘‘Plasma can be broken down into 12 different products so with changes in treatments and increased diagnoses, we are seeing an increase in the need for those,’’ Van Tilburg said.
‘‘There is no alternative for people who need blood or blood products.’’