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Show SYNTHETIC BLOOD EXTENDER PVP-Macrose May Solve Nation's Need for Synthetic Blood Plasma One of the biggest headaches of civil defense how to stockpile blood for disaster use is on the way to being eased by science. Facilities have been set up to mass-produce a synthetic "blood extender," a chemical fluid that can be used in place of whole blood or plasma in certain types of treatment. treat-ment. The product is PVP-Macrose, or polyvinyl pyrrolidone. It could be a major aid in caring for shock resulting re-sulting from burns or wounds, and Ch till "fj X ' ' f N: I f yr '(' V ; Dr. Charles E. Dutchess demonstrates dem-onstrates how a container of PVP-Macrose is suspended during dur-ing its administration to a patient. pa-tient. might save your life in the event of an atomic attack. Orders have been placed by Schenley Laboratories, Inc., for sufficient material to make 7,000,-000 7,000,-000 pints of the product. The firm is geared to bottle PVP at a rate of 300,000 pints per month. Ten thousand bottles of PVP have been turned over to the National Na-tional Research Council, which is evaluating it for use by the armed forces and other government agencies. agen-cies. Under NRC direction, tests on the product have been under way since shortly -after January 1 at more than 20 hospitals and research laboratories throughout the country. coun-try. First supplies of "radio-active" PVP, useful in studying the chemical's chem-ical's behavior in the body, are being be-ing distributed to research scientists. THIS "BLOOD EXTENDER," however, cannot duplicate all the physiological functions of human plasma. As a result, availability of a PVP stockpile in this country will not affect the need for whole blood or plasma. These advantages were listed for PVP: 1. It is completely synthetic, can be made in unlimited quantities, is not dependent on healthy human donors, can be stockpiled indefinitely. indefinite-ly. 2. It does not require refrigeration refrigera-tion or blood typing and its administration admin-istration is free from allergic reaction reac-tion in the body. 3. It can be produced at a fraction frac-tion of the cost of blood or derivatives deriva-tives of blood. 4. It is ideally suited for disaster use. PVP-Macrose is known as Periston Peris-ton in Germany, where it first was discovered in 1939 and subsequently was used on 500,000 German battle casualties in World War II. Schenley Schen-ley Laboratories is importing the intermediate-stage material from the western zone of Germany, under un-der contract agreement. It is expected ex-pected that a U.S. source of supply of the intermediate-stage material will be available this year. Medical authorities estimate that the needs for plasma or "blood extenders" ex-tenders" would run as high as 4,-000,000 4,-000,000 pints if a single atom bomb struck a major metropolitan center. The nation's ordinary peacetime needs alone for blood are about 4,500,000 pints a year. During the entire World War II period less than 14,000,000 pints of whole blood were collected. |