THE PRESENT CONDITIONS AND PROBLEMS OF NURSES WORKING AT TRANSFUSION SECTIONS IN JAPANESE HOSPITALS: FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A CERTIFIED TRANSFUSION NURSE

Nurses play an important role in managing patients and donors at the time of transfusion blood collection, and are required to have advanced knowledge of transfusion medicine and technology. To identify the present conditions and problems in blood collection, particularly at the time of aphereis procedure in hospitals, we performed a questionnaire survey of nurses working at Japanese Transfusion Society-certified transfusion institutions. We also asked the nurses for opinions on the certified transfusion nurse system. The recovery rate of the questionnaire was 55%. The ratio of responses of nurses belonging to transfusion sections was 36%. The proportion of hospitals performing 10 or more of apheresis procedures per month was 10%, 6-10 times, 9%; 3-5 times, 30%; and 1-2 times, 51%. About 40% of nurses were uneasy about managing donors or patients during the apheresis procedure, mainly related to sudden change in patient condition or mechanical trouble. Inadequate management and knowledge were considered to be the causes of the unease. About 70% of nurses approved of the establishment of a certified transfusion nurse system. From these questionnaire findings, the nursing system in transfusion sections was judged inadequate, and improvement is required. We also detected the necessity for better education of nurses regarding the technology of blood transfusion medicine. For this purpose, an authorization system led by a society is considered to be the most effective. The Japan Society of Blood Transfusion and The Japanese Society for Apheresis are expected to take the lead towards realization of these goals.