Qualitative Evaluation of Platelet Concentrates Prepared with Different Methods

Introduction: One of the most important responsibility of Blood Bank is to ensure uninterrupted supply of quality blood products, namely Platelet Concentrate (PC), which are in high demand particularly during pandemic. In India, PCs are of three types prepared by different methods like Platelet Rich Plasma-Platelet Concentrate (PRP-PC), Buffy Coat Platelet Concentrates (BC- PC), and Single Donor Platelets (SDP) units. Hence, establishing optimum quality standards across all the three types of PC remains a challenge in order to maximum benefit to recipients. Aim: To assess and compare the quality parameters of platelet concentrate prepared by PRP-PC, BC-PC and apheresis methods (SDP). Materials and Methods: This laboratory based observational study was conducted at rural, tertiary care, postgraduate, teaching hospital located at South India from December 2018 to November 2019. A total of 156 PCs were studied with 52 units belonging to PRP method, 52 units BC-PC method and the remaining were 52 units of SDP prepared by apheresis method. Quality parameters include volume, pH, swirling, White Blood Cell (WBC) count/bag, platelet count/bag and platelet indices. Platelet indices include Mean Platelet Volume (MPV), Platelet Distribution Width (PDW), and Platelet Large Cell Ratio (PLCR). Arterial Blood Gas (ABG) analysis was also done to assess (pH, partial pressure of Carbon Dioxide (pCO2), plasma bicarbonate (pHCO3-)). The p-value less than 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 23.0 used for statistical analysis. Results: All the 156 PC units were analysed as per the Director General of Health Services (DGHS) India, criteria. Among the 156 platelet concentrates scored as per DGHS criteria, a score of 5 was obtained for 34.61% [18/52], 30.76 [16/52] and 11.5% [6/52] SDP, BC-PC and PRP-PC units, respectively. All the PC units were sterile and Red Blood Cell (RBC) contamination was within acceptable limits. Conclusion: In this study, quality parameters of SDP was better than BC-PC and PRP-PC but with improvement and more standardisation of procedures and storage, BC-PC units can give a yield similar to that of SDP units.