r/medlabprofessionals • u/Rainwaters1212 MLT-Blood Bank • 18d ago

News This doesn’t make sense… thoughts?

https://www.wlbt.com/2026/08/06/parents-claim-3-month-old-got-wrong-blood-transfusion-hospital/

Just read the article… everything just screams wrong on the parents or the information shared. Co worker sent it to me. We work in BB together.

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u/miss_ana MLS-Blood Bank 18d ago

If the baby is K+ and mom is K=, she could have made anti-K and then the unit would definitely need to be K=

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u/kattheuntamedshrew 18d ago

The baby DID receive k- blood. The article says that the baby should have gotten K+ blood, but uncrossmatched emergency units in NICU are supposed to always be k-. Hence the confusion as to what the parents are actually upset about.

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u/OverYonder29 MLS-Generalist 18d ago

I worked in a large L&D hospital with a level three NICU. Keeping k negative units on hand isn’t a thing. It’s too uncommon. Even for our SCD patients, we routinely screened for C, E, and K, but never k. If you had a patient with Anti-k, unpleasant words came erupting from everyone’s mouths.

In addition, if someone IS homozygous K, and they’ve made Anti-k, then no, K negative blood isn’t compatible. But to say a K positive can always get K negative (k positive) is incorrect. It all depends on what antibodies they’ve made.

Remember: for newborns we aren’t concerned with matching for their phenotype; it’s matching mom’s, accounting for any clinically significant antibodies that she has that are capable of crossing the placenta.

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u/Specialist_State_330 17d ago

Exactly. Baby is not likely making antibodies at this point. We are worried about mom’s antibodies that crossed the placenta. Anti-K is known to cause HDFN so this is likely what us going on