Need info about donating plasma with a hole in the tubing/air exposure?
November 23, 2014 12:13 AM Subscribe
I was donating plasma and the machine apparently ate a hole in the tubing and my blood was exposed to the air or "contaminated." Obviously they can't use the plasma sample they got and didn't want me to get that blood back once they realized what happened, but I had already received some of it (whole blood) back before they shut it down. I could not find much info about this happening during plasma donation but I'm wondering what are the risks/what are the chances I might get sick from having received blood that was exposed to the environment.
blood that was exposed to the environment
How long is the exposure we are talking about? If it was on the order of a few minutes, is this not comparable to having an open wound?
Standard AskMe medical disclaimers apply, but since this happened in a hospital and they let you go it's probably not something to worry about.
posted by Dr Dracator at 1:25 AM on November 23, 2014
How long is the exposure we are talking about? If it was on the order of a few minutes, is this not comparable to having an open wound?
Standard AskMe medical disclaimers apply, but since this happened in a hospital and they let you go it's probably not something to worry about.
posted by Dr Dracator at 1:25 AM on November 23, 2014
is this not comparable to having an open wound?
Since your arteries are pressurized, blood from an open wound would spurt out, not flow back into your body. I think the key is that OP had some blood taken out of them, then exposed to the air, then directly returned to their bloodstream.
posted by Bardolph at 3:11 AM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
Since your arteries are pressurized, blood from an open wound would spurt out, not flow back into your body. I think the key is that OP had some blood taken out of them, then exposed to the air, then directly returned to their bloodstream.
posted by Bardolph at 3:11 AM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
Similar, but not exactly the same: I am a regular blood donor. Since I am O- (universal donor), I usually donate " doubles". These are kind of plasma donations in reverse; a machine removes two units of blood, filters out one unit of just red blood cells, and returns one unit of plasma to me. Twice, I've had the machines' tubing spring a leak in the middle of the procedure. Same result as yours. It never even occurred to me to worry, but I haven't experienced any bad results.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 5:10 AM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Benny Andajetz at 5:10 AM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
Best answer: I'm on hemodialysis, which is similar in several ways to plasma donation - water and dissolved substances are pulled out of the blood, which is then returned (very slightly thicker) to me.
Hemodialysis operates at a much higher rate than plasma donation, so blood leaks are more dangerous. The immediate danger is that air gets into the bloodline, and then into my body, which can cause very serious problems such as pulmonary embolism. Since the blood flow rate is so high, it can potentially pump a lot of air into my circulatory system in a short amount of time. Dialysis machines have sensors to detect air in the lines and cut off the pump. The protocol then is to remove the air, and if that's not possible, to end treatment and abandon the blood in the lines.
Longer term issues include possible infection from exposing the blood to anything outside of the sterile blood circuit, or blood loss from a prolonged leak.
posted by WasabiFlux at 3:42 PM on November 23, 2014
Hemodialysis operates at a much higher rate than plasma donation, so blood leaks are more dangerous. The immediate danger is that air gets into the bloodline, and then into my body, which can cause very serious problems such as pulmonary embolism. Since the blood flow rate is so high, it can potentially pump a lot of air into my circulatory system in a short amount of time. Dialysis machines have sensors to detect air in the lines and cut off the pump. The protocol then is to remove the air, and if that's not possible, to end treatment and abandon the blood in the lines.
Longer term issues include possible infection from exposing the blood to anything outside of the sterile blood circuit, or blood loss from a prolonged leak.
posted by WasabiFlux at 3:42 PM on November 23, 2014
Best answer: The risk to you is minimal. They are doing it per protocol, out of an abundance of caution, because blood is meant to be kept within sterile tubing or containers before being given to someone else. It actually is comparable to having an open wound, to some extent - open wounds have some small risk of infection (although most not due to air exposure, more so because bacteria from outside the body, like on the skin, can get into them). There aren't bacteria and germs flying around in the air, generally speaking. Only certain diseases can be transmitted in an airborne manner (relatively few of them - the most common you would be familiar with would be ones like chickenpox, measles, influenza and TB), but you'd still have had to have a person with one of these infectious diseases releasing infectious particles in the vicinity of the air exposure to the blood for this to be a concern, and if that were the case, you can also pick up airborne diseases from just inhaling that air too. So if there were people coughing or sneezing around the exposure site, that would be a problem, but the air itself.. well, let's move on to the air itself.
The risk of air embolism that several have mentioned is minimal to nonexistent, really. The blood was being put back into a vein, not an artery. The blood goes from your veins back to your lungs and generally any small amounts of air get reabsorbed into the capillary beds there. Large amounts of air in veins are a problem, as WasabiFlux mentions, but you likely got little to no air back in your vein, just blood exposed to air. If you had any further concern, remember that your heart beats at least 60 times per minute, the blood that came back into that vein has already recirculated through your body many many times since you donated the plasma - any problem that would have happened would have happened almost immediately after the air entered your blood vessels.
Since your arteries are pressurized, blood from an open wound would spurt out, not flow back into your body.
This is partially true, because having blood put back in your veins is different as noted above, but most open wounds are not arterial - the blood really does spurt out from an arterial wound, like it can spray across the room and hit the wall. Such wounds are not much risk for infection, although they are obviously a problem for other reasons. Most wounds are venous (they ooze rather than spurt), and if infectious material comes in contact with these open wounds, it puts the person with the wound at risk for infection.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 4:30 PM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
The risk of air embolism that several have mentioned is minimal to nonexistent, really. The blood was being put back into a vein, not an artery. The blood goes from your veins back to your lungs and generally any small amounts of air get reabsorbed into the capillary beds there. Large amounts of air in veins are a problem, as WasabiFlux mentions, but you likely got little to no air back in your vein, just blood exposed to air. If you had any further concern, remember that your heart beats at least 60 times per minute, the blood that came back into that vein has already recirculated through your body many many times since you donated the plasma - any problem that would have happened would have happened almost immediately after the air entered your blood vessels.
Since your arteries are pressurized, blood from an open wound would spurt out, not flow back into your body.
This is partially true, because having blood put back in your veins is different as noted above, but most open wounds are not arterial - the blood really does spurt out from an arterial wound, like it can spray across the room and hit the wall. Such wounds are not much risk for infection, although they are obviously a problem for other reasons. Most wounds are venous (they ooze rather than spurt), and if infectious material comes in contact with these open wounds, it puts the person with the wound at risk for infection.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 4:30 PM on November 23, 2014 [3 favorites]
Best answer: When you say donate plasma do you mean for transfusion at a blood bank? Or for sale at a plasma center?
If it's a blood bank, you can call and ask (demand?) to speak to the Medical Director to get more information. They're experts in transfusion medicine. I don't know about plasma centers but I assume they have something similar, although those places are a little shadier.
posted by radioamy at 10:14 PM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
If it's a blood bank, you can call and ask (demand?) to speak to the Medical Director to get more information. They're experts in transfusion medicine. I don't know about plasma centers but I assume they have something similar, although those places are a little shadier.
posted by radioamy at 10:14 PM on November 23, 2014 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Thank you all for your responses, a lot of helpful answers.
posted by atinna at 4:50 AM on November 24, 2014
posted by atinna at 4:50 AM on November 24, 2014
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There's no way to know from your description to what degree you are at risk of either of these, or even whether there's a real risk at all, but if you experience loss of consciousness, vertigo, convulsions, weakness in the extremities, fever, tachycardia, or any other severe medical complaint, you should get to an emergency room on the double. (Advice that holds true no matter the circumstances, really.)
tl;dr: talk to your doctor, get help if anything does go wrong, and don't give yourself an ulcer worrying about this.
posted by fifthrider at 12:48 AM on November 23, 2014 [2 favorites]