Blood bank at Ludhiana civil hospital without licence, transfusion officer for 3 years

In a serious breach of medical protocol, the Civil Hospital’s blood bank is operating without a valid licence and a designated blood transfusion officer (BTO)—both mandatory under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act.

The absence of a qualified BTO, responsible for ensuring safe transfusion practices, coupled with the lack of regulatory clearance, has raised serious concerns about oversight, accountability and patient safety at the facility, which is currently being overseen by two pathologists. To make things worse, the blood bank has been operating without a valid licence for the past three, years raising serious concerns about the safety and legality of its operations. The casual attitude of the authorities does not end here, two mobile blood vans meant for collecting blood from donation camps are non-functional.

The absence of a BTO is not a mere administrative lapse—it strikes at the heart of blood safety protocols. Under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, the BTO is responsible for supervising every aspect of blood collection, testing, processing, storage and distribution. Their signature is mandatory on all blood grouping and cross-matching reports, and they are entrusted with maintaining accurate records of blood units and transfusion activities.

“The BTO ensures that every unit of blood is safe, traceable, and properly matched. Without one, the entire system is vulnerable to errors, infections and legal violations,” said a senior official familiar with the matter.

“The BTO’s presence is a mandatory requirement for blood bank licencing and operation, ensuring the safe and effective handling of blood and blood products,” added a BTO at a private hospital.

The implications are grave. Without a BTO, there is no certified oversight of transfusion-transmissible infections (TTIs), no guarantee of compatibility testing between donor and recipient blood, and no assurance that blood components are stored and distributed under regulated conditions. The risk of contamination, mismatched transfusions and untraceable donor records looms large. Moreover, the lack of a valid licence means the blood bank is operating outside the bounds of legal authorisation, added the BTO.

Civil Surgeon Dr Ramandeep Kaur when contacted in this regard said that at present, only pathologists had been appointed to manage the blood bank, and they were handling the operations. It’s possible that no one with the required qualifications had applied for the post of the BTO. “We are in the process of applying for a licence renewal, which involves a detailed procedure where every employee must be registered online and we’re actively working on it. One of our mobile blood vans has some registration issues, and the other is under repair but will soon be functional,” she added.