Survey on the usage of therapeutic erythrocytapheresis in transfusion services in Italy for the treatment of polycythemia vera, secondary erythrocytosis and hemochromatosis.

Erythrocytapheresis, an apheresis treatment which selectively removes red blood cells, is an alternative to therapeutic phlebotomy, over which it has several advantages. Actually there is a high degree of variability in the use of this treatment. This prompted SIdEM (Italian Society of Hemapheresis and Cell Manipulation) to conduct a survey on the use of erythrocytapheresis in the Italian Transfusion Services. The purpose is to monitor this activity in the treatment of Polycythemia Vera (pv), secondary erythrocytosis and hemochromatosis. A data collection file was sent to the SIdEM regional delegates who, in turn, involved the Transfusion Centers in the areas they cover. The data collected were processed on a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. 75 centers from 14 Italian regions responded to the Survey: 36 centers (48 %) use erythrocytapheresis (35 centers perform therapeutic apheresis and 1 center only donor apheresis), 39 centers (52 %) do not (15 centers perform therapeutic apheresis, 18 centers only donor apheresis and 6 centers do not perform either therapeutic apheresis or donor apheresis). Although most centers have a substantially uniform attitude concerning the indications for which erythrocytapheresis is used, the survey shows that there are still differences more evident in the treatment of secondary erythrocytosis than in the treatment of pv or hemochromatosis. This survey has been useful to document the current Italian reality and to raise awareness about the need for improvement in optimizing and standardizing the use of a therapy with a great potential to exploit properly.

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