Blood Donor Studies

Set-up of Special Interest Group.

Blood donor studies are taking place in an increasing number of countries. The EBA Board acknowledged the importance of donor studies and approved the setup of Donor Topics Working Group/Special Interest Group in the Board Meeting in Zagreb, Spring 2016.

Background

Chairs of the group are Henrik Ullum and Christian Erikstup (both Denmark), they explain the background of the initiative: "There is an increasing focus on donor health and the importance in knowing the health consequences of blood and plasma donation and ways to mitigate the potentially harmful effects, e.g. regarding iron depletion". During the last couple of years new collaborations have been initiated and recently a proposal concerning a joint effort on donor research and management with participants from most of Europe has been submitted to the COST network (COST is the longest-running European framework supporting trans-national cooperation among researchers, engineers and scholars across Europe).

Next steps

On the plans, the chairs report: "We propose to formalize the collaboration between various blood donor study groups and blood centers interested in blood donor studies by establishing the Donor SIG. To start with we approach the key COST network proposal participants and copy EBA Board members to ensure transparency and invite new members to join the group".

Those interested in joining the SIG can write to the EBA Office.

DoHeCa Meeting

On February 10 and 11, the Donor Health Care Consortium will have a meeting in Amsterdam. The goal of the meeting is to evaluate the project and work on improvements. On Saturday morning (11/2), a forum discussion is planned between Prof. F. Bemelman, nefrologist, donors and Ms. Hildebrandt, stem cell donor recruiter. Over 12 students and 14 consortium partners have already signed up to join

I'd like to join the DoHeCa meeting

Ireland to lift lifetime deferral for MSM

The Minister for Health, has announced that from today the Irish Blood Transfusion Service (IBTS) have introduced a change to the blood donor deferral policy. This change will see the lifting of the lifetime ban on blood donations from MSM. A man who last had sex with another man more than 12 months ago will now be able to donate blood if he meets the other blood donor selection criteria. More information in the press release of the Irish DoH

List of Stakeholders for EC-CA updated

The European Commission has expanded the EC-Competent Authorities meeting to encompass, where appropriate, stakeholders from the field. EBA is on this list already. Per 12 January, a new list is available, with additional stakeholders.

Updated EC Stakeholders list (EBAse)

Final notice: Plasma Workshop

Just 5 seats are left for the Plasmapheresis Workshop - sign up now for the last seats!

SaBTO: universal screening for HEV

End of December, the expert advisory committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (SaBTO) published minutes of their November meeting in which they advise universal HEV screening for all blood components: "Based on the best estimates of costs and workload across the healthcare system, universal screening of donated blood for HEV would deliver the same benefits for patients as does provision of screened components to selected patients, but at a lower overall cost and with a lower risk of errors occurring in blood provision and patient management. Therefore,[...], the Committee recommends that universal screening of blood donations for HEV should be introduced by the UK Blood Services as soon as it is practical to do so." The minutes of the meeting are public and can be found on the site of SaBTO (.pdf)

Zika Testing Capacity (EBAse)

From Pistoia to Florence

The 2017 Autumn Board Meeting will take place in Florence, and not in Pistoia, as announced earlier. The host of the meeting, the Italian National Blood Centre, decided on this because of reasons of hotel availability. The dates will remain the same: September 28-29, 2017.

Zika Virus Testing Capacity

At the request of the ECDC (European Centre for Disease Control) and the European Commission, the EBA requested your data for assessing the testing capability in Europe. The item was discussed in the EBA Board Meeting in Frankfurt and the letter has been sent to the EC.The full responses from all members can now be found on EBAse. Also, currently, the EBA with the EBA EID Monitor is commenting the new draft Zika Risk Assessment by the ECDC.

Board Meeting Cardiff (2nd call)

Board Members can now register for the EBA Board Meeting in Cardiff (6/7 April) through this link (Surveymonkey) and reserve a hotel room through this dedicated website.

Calender of Events

January
20 | EBA Values, Issues, Policues Task Force Teleconference
20 | EBA WG Contingency Planning Teleconference

February
2 | EBA Executive Teleconference
7 | PBM Consensus Conference Scientific Committee Meeting | Frankfurt, Germany
7-8 | Benchmarking Workshop "Plasma Collection for Fractionation" | Amsterdam, the Netherlands | Register via email
10-11 | DoHeCa Consortium Meeting | Amsterdam, the Netherlands

March
2-3 | Technological, regulatory and organizational tools to produce plasma for fractionation” | IPFA Asia Workshop on Plasma quality and supply |Yogyakarta, Indonesia
22-24 | Appropriate use of Blood Components | NIBTS | Belfast, Northern-Ireland | Save-the-Date | Programme | Information

April
6-7 | EBA Board meeting | Cardiff, Wales
20-21 | Sanquin Spring Seminar | Amsterdam, the Netherlands

May
16-17 | IPFA/PEI 24^th International Workshop on "Surveillance and Screening of Blood-borne Pathogens" | Zagreb, Croatia

June
17-21 | 27th Regional ISBT Congress | Copenhagen, Denmark

September
11-12 | IPFA/BCA 3^rd Global Symposium | Global need for PDMP's | Atlanta, GA, USA
28-29 | EBA Board meeting, Florence, Italy

2018
April
12-13 | EBA Board meeting, Helsinki, Finland