Perioperative autotransfusion. Avoiding donated risks

Because of the risks associated with donated blood, although slight, intraoperative and postoperative autotransfusion is becoming the wave of the future. "Intraoperative autotransfusion," according to Ken Williamson, MD, of the Mayo Clinic, "is now a medically indicated procedure." Cost effectiveness, once raised as an objection to intraoperative autotransfusion, is no longer considered; disease prevention is paramount. Every OR nurse should become familiar with the operation of the autotransfusion machines and be able to set up such a machine and operate it in an emergency. In our institution, one OR nurse can run two machines in different operating rooms because blood loss into the orthopedic wound is usually slow. Inservice training for nurses is readily available from the manufactures' representative or distributors. All in all, nurses-especially OR nurses-must prepare to be part of the autotransfusion team in the 1990s and beyond.