Downer

Afternoon

So then Willemot comes back with contradictory information she's been given. Home transfusions are theoretically feasible. In practice, there are problems. The main problem is who administers the blood products. The whole operation from the first bag to the last, takes up over five hours: one pochette of platelets, two pochettes of red blood cells. It has to be carried out by a nurse with enough experience, and in the presence of a doctor who can intervene in case of complications (shock, usually during the first fifteen minutes of each pochette). This means in effect that both would have to stay for the entire five hours. Six hours coming and going.

The key question thus becomes if we can find a nurse with the required profile and a doctor who at least once a week - probably during the evening hours - would be prepared to offer his or her services. My doctor would be prepared to do it but not too readily. She has a family. At any rate, she wouldn't do it without a capable nurse. Our own string of nurses (from an organization called Aremis) are proscribed from doing it.

I will look into possibilities. But the assignment is admittedly a tough one.