People forgetting or being uncertain about their blood type is far from scarce, but it almost cost a 50-year-old woman from Nantou County her life were it not for a timely blood test.
Chiu Li-kuei (邱麗桂), a Nantou Hospital medical technologist, spoke about the incident on the sidelines of an awards ceremony held by the Ministry of Health and Welfare in Taipei yesterday morning to honor 50 medical specialists, including Chiu, for their special dedication and stellar achievements.
The 50 recipients were selected from 1,986 medical personnel at 26 hospitals nationwide.
“The woman always thought that she was blood type O, a belief reinforced by a lack of discomfort after she was transfused with type O blood following a traffic accident two decades ago,” Chiu said.
Two years ago, Chiu said the patient came to the hospital to undergo bone surgery and a preoperative blood test found that her blood was not the classic type O.
A further test discovered that the woman actually had the rarest blood type, Bombay phenotype hh, Chiu said, adding that irregular antibodies were also detected in her body that could have been produced after the blood transfusion 20 years previously.
“If she had been given classic type O blood during the surgery, the woman could have suffered a potentially fatal red blood cell rupture, also known as a hemolytic reaction,” Chiu said.
According to the Taiwan Blood Services Foundation, Bombay phenotype hh has an incidence rate of one in 10,000 people and is commonly mistaken for type O.
“Like the classic blood group, the Bombay blood group can also be divided into four types — O, A, B and AB. As of last year, 66 people in the nation were known to have type A Bombay phenotype blood, 61 with type B, 51 with type O and 11 with type AB,” foundation official Li Lei (黎蕾) said.
Taiwan does not exclude the possibility of having formal diplomatic relations with countries that also have formal ties with China, regardless of Beijing’s stance, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Sunday. There was speculation in 2012 that Honduras was attempting to have simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taiwan and China, an idea that then-minister of foreign affairs David Lin (林永樂) rejected. Honduras severed formal ties with Taiwan on Sunday morning after establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing. President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration has taken a more practical approach to relations with like-minded countries since assuming government in 2016. Previous administrations took the
Seven senior faculty members, including the principal, of a high school in Taichung were temporarily suspended from their jobs on Friday, pending an investigation by the Taichung Education Bureau into alleged bullying and abuse that led to the suicide of a student last month. The city’s education officials were too slow to suspend those involved, the student’s father told a news conference on Wednesday, at which Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chang Liao Wan-chien (張廖萬堅) and members of the Humanistic Education Foundation were also present. The boy had been a good student and a high achiever during elementary and junior-high, and had
Taiwan would have established formal relations with Argentina long ago if not for China’s interference, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Yui told US-based Spanish-language online news outlet Infobae in an interview published on Tuesday. Beijing has left behind a string of unfulfilled promises in Latin America, including pledges to build the Grand Nicaragua Canal and airports, docks, ports and industrial zones in El Salvador, he said. Meanwhile, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Mexico and other countries enjoy pragmatic and improving relations with Taiwan based on cooperation on the economy, culture, technology and science, he said. While Taiwan is “happy to live and let live,”
WASHED ASHORE: Of the 16 bodies discovered along Taiwan’s west coast this month, two were Vietnamese and five were Taiwanese, coast guard officials said Minister of Justice Tsai Ching-hsiang (蔡清祥) said that he has instructed prosecutors and maritime authorities to launch investigations after 16 bodies were found along Taiwan’s west coast this month, amid speculation that they were victims of smuggling or human trafficking rings. Coast Guard Administration (CGA) officials said the bodies, most of which had washed ashore, were found by coast guard personnel and local residents along the coastline from Keelung to Kaohsiung. Thirteen of the bodies are male and three are female, the CGA said, adding that items found on the bodies indicate that two of the men were Vietnamese, while three men
RSS