Principles Of Plasma And Plasma Derivatives
Plasma and its derivatives are well-established clinical resources, but cost, risk of infectious disease transmission, although rare, and other adverse effects mandate their appropriate use. Continued investigation is warranted to clarify optimal and appropriate clinical indications/protocols for plasma product use. Plasma can be separated from red blood cells through centrifugation of whole blood at the time of collection or can be collected by apheresis as a single product or as a by-product of platelet or RBC apheresis. Plasma can also be processed into derivatives through cold ethanol fractionation, via additional factor purification steps, and treated with pathogen reduction technologies. With the advent of genetic and cellular engineering modalities, the development of recombinant products with no human proteins is possible. In this chapter, the features and uses of plasma products, which include fresh frozen plasma (FFP), plasma frozen within 24 hours of phlebotomy (FP24), thawed plasma, liquid plasma, solvent detergent treated plasma (SD-plasma), pathogen-reduced plasma, cryoprecipitate, pathogen-reduced cryoprecipitate, cryoprecipitate-reduced plasma (CRP), as well as plasma derivatives, including albumin, intravenous and intramuscular immunoglobulin, and purified and recombinant coagulation factor concentrates, are discussed.
