Onboarding · Part 3 of 5

Supplying hospitals that don't have a blood bank

How a blood center sets up the nursing homes and hospitals it supplies, and works each request from sample to issue, invoice and return.

Most standalone centers supply nursing homes and small hospitals that have no blood bank of their own. This guide shows how a center sets up those hospitals in VenaShield today and handles their requests.

Add the hospital as a partner

Open Exchange & Loans → Loan Dashboard and add the hospital to the External Entity Master, with:

• Name
• Type: Hospital
• Licence number (optional)
• Address (optional)
• Contact person and phone (optional)

The hospital belongs to your site's partner list, and other centers don't see it.

When a request comes in

Today the hospital sends its request the usual way: a requisition form with the patient's sample, a phone call, or a message. Your issue technician then works it in VenaShield.

1. Receive the sample. In Laboratory → Serology Link → Sample Reception, accept or reject the tube and record the direct antiglobulin test. Each accepted sample gets a lab ID.
2. Group and crossmatch. Record the patient's group and the crossmatch. VenaShield decides compatible or incompatible from the grades you enter.
3. Issue. In Issue / Dispatch, choose the unit and enter the patient's name and blood group, the hospital's name and the indication. Emergency release without a crossmatch needs a doctor's written reason.
4. Bill. In Generate Invoice, the invoice uses your rate card and the add-ons you chose. Free-supply categories come to zero automatically.

The Issue Register keeps every issue with the patient, hospital, unit and who issued it. It is the record an inspector asks for.

Returns and reactions

Returns. If the hospital sends a unit back unused, record the return in Issue / Dispatch. It goes back to stock only if the cold chain was kept.

Reactions. If a patient reacts, record it on the Transfusion Reaction page. VenaShield holds the donor's other units until a medical officer closes the case.

Next in the series: How donors pre-register for VenaShield centers