The vital work with blood and blood products for many patients in Würzburg began 75 years ago. Employees of the Surgical Clinic of the University of Würzburg produced their first preserved blood. That was in 1948. “Back then, the blood was collected in punch cylinders, which – hardly imaginable from today’s perspective – were sealed with a cotton ball,” reports Professor Markus Böck, a specialist in transfusion medicine at the University Hospital of Würzburg (UKW). Today, the Institute for Clinical Transfusion Medicine and Hemotherapy is one of the central facilities of the University Hospital Würzburg.
First blood donation center in Bavaria
In the past 75 years, the blood donation and blood transfusion center has continued to develop. Technical progress and the introduction of modern devices played an important role. In 1950, for example, vacuum bottles were used for donating blood at the university hospital for the first time. From that time on, UKW also gave canned goods to other clinics, making it the first blood donation center in Bavaria.
In the 1960s, preparative plasmapheresis was introduced and blood plasma was obtained at the Würzburg University Hospital. In this procedure, the plasma fraction is separated from the blood cells outside the body. The donor receives the blood cells back and the plasma is collected. “With these developments, the Würzburg University Hospital was one of the nationwide pioneers of transfusion medicine at the time,” explains Böck.
In 1977 the blood donation center, now “Department for Transfusion Medicine and Immunohaematology”, purchased the first cell separator for plasma exchange treatments and so-called therapeutic cytapheresis. In therapeutic cytapheresis, plasma or certain cellular components can be removed from the patient’s blood in a targeted manner. This method is used in autoimmune diseases but also in forms of leukemia.
