The shelf life of red blood cell components (RBCs) in Japan was extended from 21 days to 28 days in March 2023, but still remains shorter than the 36 to 43 days in other countries. It is expected that extension of RBC shelf life will reduce wastage. However, irradiation of RBCs to avoid graft-versus-host disease may cause storage lesions. Here, we investigated whether the later irradiation of RBCs reduces the deterioration of RBC quality and contributes to the extension of shelf life.
We irradiated RBCs on either day 2, 7, 14, or 21 post-collection during 42-day storage. We set the in vitro quality of RBCs irradiated on day 2 and stored until day 28 as the control. We compared the quality of RBCs irradiated later (days 7, 14, or 21) on days 28, 35, and 42, respectively, with the control. Late irradiation did not reduce the increased hemolysis or decreased ATP concentration on days 35 and 42. Only RBCs irradiated on day 21 and stored until day 35 had supernatant potassium concentrations equal to control values. RBCs irradiated on day 14 and stored until day 35, and those irradiated on day 21 and stored until day 42 showed deformability equal to control values.
These results suggest that late irradiation is less effective in maintaining the quality of RBCs after 35 days storage and less useful for extension of the shelf life of RBCs.
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