Control of blood utilization

Joseph D Sweeney1

  • 1Transfusion Services, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA. jsweeney@lifespan.org

Blood utilization may be viewed as the response to any one of three questions. How much blood is transfused? Who are recipients? Why did the physician prescribe the blood products? Considerable data exists to answer the first question, and some data exists regarding the second. However, answering the third question is the real key to the control of blood utilization.

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