The centrifuge is a blood separation machine that separates blood components and the refrigerator is used for storing blood. The high speed machine costs more than Rs 3 million, which the blood bank said is beyond what it can afford. [break]
"The existing machine at the blood bank is of low capacity and in view of the rise in demand for blood recently we need a higher capacity machine," Hari Prasad Neupane, president of Nepal Red Cross Society Chitwan, said.
The existing machine can separate the blood components of only four pints of blood in six hours. Neupane said that the machine the blood bank is demanding can separate 12 pints in six hours.
Blood contains 55 percent blood plasma and the rest is blood cells such as red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets.
Dengue patients do not need all the components of blood. Doctors transfuse only the components that they required. In the past they used to give the entire blood, said Ramesh Poudel, chief of the blood bank in Chitwan.
Poudel said dengue patients need platelets and these can be extracted within six hours of a blood donation. "We need a high speed machine to separate platelets from more blood," he said adding that platelets die six hours after the blood is donated.
A joint meeting organized by Nepal Red Cross Society Chitwan and attended by the chief district officer (CDO), the local development officer (LDO) and other stakeholders has already sent a letter to the Ministry of Health seeking financial assistance for buying the centrifuge.
Related story
World Blood Donor Day 2019: ‘Safe blood for all
