30.07.12
Specialist tubing shortage in NHS
The NHS is facing dwindling supplies of specialist medical tubing for dialysis, due to a global shortage.
The tubing, used for transporting blood to and from dialysis equipment, is not re-useable and lasts for 72 hours, so hospitals need continual restocking. The only factories that produce the tubing, owned by US company Baxter, were both damaged by the earthquake in northern Italy in May.
The company has said they could only guarantee limited supplies of the tubing up to October 8, after which point there would be a gap of a week before fresh supplies could be dispatched.
In response, the DH is conducting an inventory of stocks. Some hospitals have reported that they do not have enough tubing to support dialysis machines through the shortage.
Roughly half of NHS intensive care wards use Baxter dialysis machines, and there are no equivalent rival products to use as an alternative to the tubing.
Julian Bion, dean of the UK’s Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine told the Financial Times that though hospitals might be able to deal with the shortage for a day, “one week would put patients’ lives at risk”.
Healthcare experts have recommended that some hospitals are restocked from surpluses in other healthcare service inventories.
Hospitals could invest in new dialysis machines that do not use the same tubes in the treatment, but acquiring new equipment is very expensive, as is re-training staff.
The Department of Health has said: “Initial feedback from the NHS suggests that this potential interruption can be managed effectively, and contingency plans will be put in place to minimise any potential impact on patients. Existing stocks are being managed as effectively as possible.”
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