Blood supply chain management and future research opportunities

Abstract

In this chapter, we discuss the challenges and research opportunities in the blood collection operations and explore the benefits of recent advances in the blood donation process. According to the regulations, donated blood has to be processed in a processing facility within 6 h of donation. This forces blood donation organizations to schedule continuous pickups from donation sites. The underlying mathematical problem is a variant of well-known Vehicle Routing Problem (VRP). The main differences are the perishability of the product to be collected, and the continuity of donations. We discuss the implications of such differences on collection routes from donation centers. Recent advances such as multicomponent apheresis (MCA) allow the donation of more than one component and/or more than one transfusable unit of each blood product. MCA provides several opportunities including (1) increasing the donor utilization, (2) tailoring the donations based on demand, and (3) reducing the infection risks in the transfusion. We also discuss MCA, its potential benefits and how to best use MCA in order to improve blood products availability and manage donation/disposal costs.