9 received plasma therapy in GMC Jammu since Oct 1

Jammu: In the twenty-five days since Government Medical College Jammu started collection of Convalescent Plasma, only nine recovered COVID19 patients have donated their blood plasma, and an equal number of patients have received plasma therapy.
Dr Meena Sidhu, Head of Department, Blood & Transfusion Medicine GMC Jammu, told The News Now that so far, nine recovered COVID19 patients have turned up to donate plasma, and nine patients have received the therapy to aid their recovery.
“Most of the plasma donors are the doctors and post graduate students of the institute, who had caught the deadly virus when serving their duties in isolation wards meant for COVID19 patients,” she adds.
Notably, GMC had started Convalescent Plasma Therapy (CPT) on 1st October as one of the treatment methods for critical COVID19 patients, as approved by the Government of India and Indian Council for Medical Research.
Further, Drug Controller General of India (DGCI) has permitted to use CP as ‘Off-label’ in moderate cases of COVID 19, which are not maintaining the oxygen saturation even after steroids.
Dr Sidhu explains, “As per the Standard Operating Procedures, CP is collected from recovered COVID19 patients, and shall contain neutralizing antibodies against SARS-COV-2 virus. The donors shall be more than eighteen years of age, shall be male or nulliparous female weighing more than fifty five kilograms. One plasma collection means two units, 200 ml each.”
Additional criteria for the donors include complete resolution of symptoms at least 28 days prior to donation, or complete resolution of symptoms at least 14 days prior to donation and two negative real-time PCR test for COVID 19 from nasopharyngeal swab, collected 24 hours apart; Donors who have had COVID diagnosis more than 4 months will be excluded from donation as per ICMR guidelines; The donor eligibility for whole blood donation will be followed in accordance to the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940 and Rules 1945 therein (as amended till March 2020).
Regarding the ICMR contemplating to remove CPT from COVID19 treatment protocol as a study showed little to no benefit, Dr Sidhu says, “We are yet to conduct a study on our patients for effectiveness of plasma therapy. But they seem to have benefitted from it. If there’s a change in treatment guidelines, we shall follow them.”
She appealed to the recovered patients to come up for plasma donation, save lives and help combat the pandemic.