In January 2019, the European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines & HealthCare (EDQM) and the European Commission (EC) organised the International Symposium on Plasma Supply Management. This event – the first of its kind – brought together stakeholders in the blood sector to discuss the increasing use of plasma for fractionation. Participants addressed the matter of increasing the availability of plasma for fractionation in Europe as one of the main strategies for avoiding shortages of the plasma-derived medicinal products that patients with life-threatening diseases need.
After the symposium, a set of recommendations jointly drafted by stakeholder representatives was made available on the EDQM web site. The proceedings of the event, containing all the presentations and summaries of the main topics addressed during the sessions, have now also been published by the EDQM. The outcome of the symposium provided an evidence base for the revision of the Guide to the preparation, use and quality assurance of blood components (the Blood Guide, now in its 20th edition) and has contributed to identifying strategies to increase the availability of plasma for fractionation in order to achieve self-sufficiency in Europe.
The proceedings of the International Symposium on Plasma Supply Management can be downloaded from Freepub, the EDQM free publications platform.
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