7:00pm-8:00pm on Thursday 31 March
Times shown are in GMT (UTC +0) up to the 26th March. For events on or after 27th March times are in BST (UTC +1).
Lecture Theatre A - University of Cambridge Admissions Office, New Museums site, Bene't Street, CB2 3PT
How can research ensure the health and safety of blood donors? Join researchers and blood service staff to learn about studies comparing methods for testing haemoglobin levels in blood donors, using ferritin (a protein that contains iron) to determine when donors should give blood and how these studies directly changed blood service policy.
Globally, around 100 million blood transfusions happen every year, saving millions of lives. England’s blood service depends on blood donations to supply blood to the NHS, but also has a responsibility to ensure the health and safety of blood donors. Although blood donation has been practised for more than a century, uncertainties have persisted such as how to ensure that donors are not bled when they are at risk of anaemia (a shortage of red blood cells or of haemoglobin resulting in extreme tiredness).
Professor Emanuele Di Angelantonio (Cambridge), Dr Katja van den Hurk (Dutch blood service) and Professor David Roberts (English blood service) will talk about their studies comparing methods for testing haemoglobin levels in blood donors, using ferritin (a protein that contains iron) to determine when donors should give blood and how these studies directly changed blood service policy.
This research is conducted by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Blood and Transplant Research Unit (BTRU) in Donor Health and Genomics at Cambridge, in partnership with NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT; www.nhsbt.nhs.uk; www.blood.co.uk), to advance the field of blood donor health. A short discussion will follow the talk.
www.donorhealth-btru.nihr.ac.uk
Twitter: @DonorHealthBTRU
Key words: NHS, medicine, health, biology, blood donation, policy
