Why this symposium and next steps

The list of findings, questions, and opportunities is long, but doable. The best blood system from donor to patient does not yet exist, but the pieces are all there for modeling and implementation. The key - the hard part - is to identify those that improve quality without raising and even perhaps lowering long-term costs and risks to patients. Unfortunately, hospitals are under such cost pressures that investing in blood-related technologies seems an extravagance when blood accounts for only about 1 percent of a hospital's budget. But blood-related procedures can drive up to one-fifth of a hospital's patient care. Without blood, most transplants cannot be done, nor can major cancer therapies and major trauma resuscitation. But fortunately, if hospitals work together with a local blood supplier, economies of scale can be realized and implementing new processes and technologies are not daunting.