Our current system assigns a suffix to the parent unit number when aliquots are made. How will aliquots be handled with the ISBT 128 standard?
Even in Codabar, the product code should have changed rather than affixing a suffix to the unit number. Although many systems append the unit number, it is technically incorrect. In ISBT 128, the product code data structure has 8 characters. The first 5 are considered the “product code”, the 6th identifies the type of donation, and the 7th and 8th characters are for divisions and splits. Let’s take a CPDA-1 Red Blood Cell, 450 mL collection, leukoreduced. This has a product code of E0209. It’s from a volunteer donor so the sixth character is V. Undivided, the full code is E0209V00. If you split this once, the codes go to E0209VA0 and E0209VB0. The “product description code” itself doesn’t change, but the division codes do. If you take the E0209VA0 and divide it into three syringes, they become E0209VAa, E0209VAb and E0209Ac. Again, the E0209 part stays the same, but division codes reflect the daughter products. So, there remains a relationship between the parent and daughter products.
