Hyderabad: With seven out of 10 critical patients in hospitals that turn into dengue fever patients, platelet demand, especially single donor platelets have sky-skyrocketing.
Apart from the request for social media groups, most blood banks see requests of 10 to 20 units every day and the situation only tends to deteriorate further, experts say.
“Even though it reaches friends, acquaintances, blood banks, and social media groups who are very active, relatives of patients spend 24 hours on average to get donors and dozens of demand flows,” said the Red Cross Blood Bank.
The same echoed by Aarohi Blood Bank in the city.
In one case like that, relatives produce more than 50 calls and reach all possible options to get platelets.
“My 14-year-old niece is very important with less than 5,000 platelet counts on Saturday and regardless of all our efforts can only get one unit on Saturday night.
The next day we got another unit from the police and several other groups reached us.
He now Recovered and in the ICU but I would say we were lucky to get it on time, “said Srikanth Uyala, added that because of the Covid-19 situation, the donor continued to be reluctant to contribute.
Srikanth has posted a request on Twitter on Saturday.
Apart from the reluctance of donors, single donor platelets are not stored by blood banks because they can only be stored for up to five days.
The blood bank offers to separate trombesasi but it is difficult to get donors.
“We see up to five requests per day each requesting 1 or 2 units.
Unlike before when we use Plasma requests, we now see platelet requests, especially since the last 10 days,” said Arun Daniel Yellamaty, founder Youngistan.
The platelet transfusion, meanwhile, is needed when the number of platelets fell below 10,000 from a normal range of 150,000 to 450,000 platelets per microliter of blood.
“If the platelet number is less than 10,000 or if there are bloody manifestations such as blood in urine, benches, stomachs or brains, blood transfusions are needed,” said Dr.
Mn Lakshmiks Reddy, an internal drug consultant, hospital.