Project lead: Helen Thom, RCI Development Lead
The Transfusion 2024 strategic plan outlined the urgent need to strengthen support for Hospital Transfusion Laboratories (HTL) to ensure safe provision of care for patients in need of transfusion. There was an action to undertake pilots of integrated transfusion services between NHSBT Red Cell Immunohaematology (RCI) and HTLs.
RCI Assist and Remote Interpretation
A pilot of remote interpretation was undertaken across Path Links Pathology Network, supported by RCI Barnsley, and East and South East London Pathology Partnership, supported by RCI Tooting. The pilot was underpinned by the referral support tool, RCI Assist and included four points at which a ‘dry’ referral could be made to RCI, where analyser results were emailed to RCI for remote interpretation without the need to send the traditional ‘wet’ sample.
RCI Assist guides users when processing samples in the HTL to ensure appropriate investigation of patients requiring red cell transfusion support. The referral support tool contains decision points to either refer cases to RCI or resolve in-house and is supported with pop up information to improve staff confidence.
Results from the pilot can be found in the updates section.
