In the United States, the FDA licenses Red Blood Cells Frozen (RBCF) up to 10 years and the AABB (AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF BLOOD BANKS)'s Standards allow frozen storage of blood for routine transfusion up to 10 years.
But in Japan, the storage period of RBCF for routine transfusion allowed is 5 years and that of the thawed, deglycerolized red blood cells (DRBC) is only 12 hours at 4-6°.
The quality of RBCF stored for 5 years or 10 years was investigated to extend the storage period of RBCF and DRBC.
ATP levels and morphology scores of DRBC stored for 10 years were high as those of DRBC stored for 5 years but 2, 3-DPG levels were slightly low.
The hemolysis of DRBC immediately after deglycerolization was low, but increased rapidly with the storage. The result obtained indicated that the quality of the DRBC was maintained in good conditions. We would like to propose to extend the storage period of the RBCF up to 10 years.
