Adetokunbo Fabamwo, a Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the Lagos State University College of Medicine (LASUCOM) Ikeja, is the Chief Medical Director (CMD) of the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, (LASUTH).

In this interview with VINCENT KURAUN, he spoke on the fraud allegation at the LASUTH blood bank and the benefits of blood donation.

What is the standard procedure or practice about the operation of the blood bank at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital?

There are many procedures. You can start with blood donation. We have a blood donation procedure for patients who want to make voluntary blood donations either just for altruistic purposes or maybe the relatives are about to undergo surgery and they want to donate blood in readiness for that. We have that programme going on.

Then, we have the operation of the blood bank itself. The role of the laboratory scientists who work there is to ensure that they make blood available to all those who need it either in emergency cases or cases that have been planned for operation.

But let me start with history. Before 2020, most of the hospitals in Lagos State that had antenatal care facilities and delivery facilities made it mandatory that the husbands of women who want to register for antenatal care should donate one pint of blood before the women could be registered.

So, because of that, there was never a shortage of blood in Lagos State hospitals. There used to be plenty of blood in Lagos State hospitals. But in 2020, SERAP, a human rights organisation went to court challenging that practice and the court gave the decision in favour of SERAP that hospitals should no longer ask for blood donation from the husbands before the women are registered.

So, we stopped that practice and that has led to an acute shortage of blood in many of the hospitals because there was no longer some surplus blood donated by husbands of prospective antenatal clients.

Right now, there is a general scarcity of transfusable blood in Lagos State hospitals.

Some patients and relatives recently claimed on X that the blood they donated days before their surgery was not available for the surgery and some claimed some officials of LASUTH were charging money for blood donation …

Now, the specific issue that was reported on X (Twitter) was that patients had donated blood in preparation for their surgery, but on the day of their surgery, they were told that there was no blood available for them again. That was the specific allegation.

One first thing I would say is that it is uncharitable to say things like that because they only happen once in a while. To start with, that kind of event in which a patient will donate blood and on the day of the surgery, they may not find the specific blood for him is not common. Saying that is tantamount to fraud in LASUTH blood bank is uncharitable. Let me explain.

Earlier on in my explanation, I said two groups of people come to the donation center, either you want to donate in readiness for your relation who is going to have surgery or you just feel like donating because you are a good-hearted person.

For the first group, it is supposed to be a guarantee that on the day of surgery, a cross-match blood is made available, but I will want to explain to you why you may have occasional cases where on the day of surgery, there may not be blood.

The first thing is that there is a general scarcity of blood. That blood you donated for your parents could have been used for an emergency case, but that does not mean that the day your patient needs it, they shouldn’t give them the blood that they require.

What has been happening is that some of our junior doctors don’t request their surgical cases in time. For instance, if there is surgery that is supposed to be done on Monday, a good junior doctor could have gone to the blood bank three days before that Monday to say I have surgery on Monday, my patient has donated blood, please get blood available on Monday.

If those at the blood bank now check and they see that they don’t have such blood, there are ways of scouting throughout blood banks in the state to get that blood.

In the cases in which they will come and say there’s no blood on the day of surgery, most of the time it is because the request was not made in time by the young doctors. So, I am blaming the young doctors now who are supposed to prepare patients ready for surgery.

What we do in LASUTH now or what we have decided to do now is that, for such cases that may come suddenly like that, instead of telling the parents that there’s no blood and that they should go and source for blood themselves, we will never do that again.

What we will now do is to have an understanding with some nearby private blood banks where we will go and get the requisite blood for the patient and later when we now have blood we will replace it.

So, going forward that is what we have decided to do now and also we have taken measures in-house to correct the practice whereby young doctors, who don’t go in time to the blood bank to ensure that cases for elective surgery, will have blood on the day of operation.

For some people who may want to voluntarily donate blood at the hospital, what do they need to know?

People should know that when you are coming to donate blood, you are checked to ensure that you are fit to donate blood.

LASUTH blood donation clinic is open from 8 am to 6 pm every day from Monday to Friday and during the weekends also, but the closing time is 2 pm.

Also, there are some little incentives that are not monetary. We don’t give money to people who come for voluntary donations.

We give them cards with which we record their donations and they carry the cards with them everywhere such that if they are, for instance, victims of accidents and we see that this is a voluntary blood donor, the person will be given all the blood that they require without questions being asked at the point of treatment.

They have that singular advantage if there are regular voluntary blood donors. So, we encourage people to come forward and donate blood voluntarily. A lot of individuals are carrying much more blood than they need in their bodies and some of these cause particular diseases in them.

If your blood level is too high, you are prone to certain diseases but people don’t know this. People should be encouraged to come forward and donate blood from time to time voluntarily. That is what I have to say about that.

For people who require blood, how much are they supposed to pay at the blood bank?

Let me just put it to you straight, when there is an emergency and there’s blood required, it is given without asking for money. The only money they pay is just money for testing the blood to make sure that it is compatible with their own body and not the blood itself. What we encourage and demand is that, after giving you blood at an emergency point, you must replace it before you go home.

If at the emergency point, you are given six pints, you are required to bring in six people to come and replace it before you go home and that is the practice. So, there is no issue with payment for blood. Blood is not what we buy on the shelves, some people must have donated it. So, paying for blood is a highly discouraged practice and we don’t do it.