December 4, 2003
Researcher to report on process to preserve blood platelets longer
Dr. Sherrill Slichter, UW professor of medicine and Puget Sound Blood Center executive vice president of research, will present new information on improving platelet preservation at the American Society of Hematology (ASH) annual meeting next week in San Diego, Calif.
According to Slichter, an internationally recognized expert in platelet research, early findings indicate that it may be possible to increase the time platelets can be preserved from five days to eight days or more. Platelets are a blood component essential to keep people from bleeding and the survival of many cancer patients and victims of trauma depends upon a steady supply of them.
Platelets, however, are extremely fragile and require special handling and storage in order to keep them viable. Naturally, prolonging their availability could save more lives, since blood centers across the country would be able to ship platelets greater distances or to more remote parts of the country.
“Increasing platelet storage times can have tremendous implications for transfusion medicine,” said Slichter. “Today’s stem cell transplantation for cancer patients, for example, just would not be possible if not for the availability of platelets. Additionally, anyone suffering from extreme trauma requires platelet transfusions to control their bleeding. By extending the shelf life of platelets, maintaining an adequate supply becomes less difficult.”
Slichter will present her research study, “Long-Term Platelet Storage: In Vivo Platelet Viability Maintained for 8 Days in Plasma and 13 Days in Plasmalyte,” on Dec. 8 before many of the country’s leading hematologists and scientists.
Slichter noted that the research is in its early stages and the process requires FDA approval.
