Cheuk Kwong Lee1, Jin Ye Yeo2
1Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service, Hong Kong, China; 2AOB Editorial Office, AME Publishing Company
Correspondence to: Jin Ye Yeo. AOB Editorial Office, AME Publishing Company. Email: aob@amegroups.com
Expert introduction
Dr. Cheuk Kwong Lee (Figure 1) is currently the Chief Executive and Medical Director of the Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service. He received his undergraduate and medical training at the University of Hong Kong and became specialist in Hematology and Hematological oncology at the Queen Mary Hospital, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong. After 8 years of clinical work, he moved to Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service where he became the head of Blood Collection and Donor Recruitment Department. Apart from his role in securing safe and adequate blood supply to patients in Hong Kong, Dr. Lee is also the head of Hong Kong Bone Marrow Donor Registry which provide unrelated hematopoietic stem cells to patients undergoing transplantation.
Dr. Lee has developed interest at transfusion microbiology and donor health and medicine. He has made extensive contribution in understanding and implementing preventive measure in minimizing transfusion transmitted bacterial sepsis. Besides, as healthy and committed donors are success to the blood service, Dr. Lee has been actively involved in studies to understand and minimize donation related vasovagal reaction and donors’ hemoglobin and iron.
Recently, he and his team are actively working to increase the awareness and knowledge of the territory on blood supply, blood transfusion, and patient blood management.
Figure 1 Dr. Cheuk Kwong Lee
Interview
AOB: How did your interest in blood transfusion and transfusion microbiology develop?
Dr. Lee: My interest in transfusion medicine or transfusion microbiology began when I started my career in clinical hematology since 1994. Being a hematologist, I was a heavy user ordering a lot of blood components. At that time, I was aware of the importance of transfusion-transmitted bacterial sepsis as reported by my seniors at the bone marrow transplantation (BMT) setting where patients received a lot of platelet transfusion. There had been good discussions on the various ways of prevention.
Once I moved to Blood Transfusion Service in 1999, I found that my scope of work could be wider and more influential. Therefore, I gradually had more interest in these two areas. At the same time, my work in ensuring blood safety and quality drove me towards a better understanding of blood supply and transfusion medicine, and developed my interest in transfusion medicine research.
AOB: Could you provide an overview of the current landscape of publications in transfusion microbiology? Are there any particular topics or articles that stood out to you?
Dr. Lee: Despite many works and our contribution in transfusion microbiology research, the latest development in this area has slowed down quite a lot. The use of pathogen reduction technology has greatly enhanced blood and transfusion safety. However, a solid understanding is still needed not only for the surveillance and monitoring of the effectiveness of various mitigating measures, but also to provide advice on investigations of reactions that suggest a possibility of transfusion transmitted bacterial sepsis. For example, biofilm formation remains one that could cause bacterial sepsis despite mitigating measures are in place.
AOB: Are there any aspects of transfusion microbiology research that you believe have been overlooked or received insufficient attention?
Dr. Lee: Skin disinfection could be further studied with newer/ other less allergic agents. Chlorhexidine, a commonly used antiseptic and disinfectant, does cause an increased incidence of skin allergy.
AOB: Your article in AOB, “Frequencies of ABO and RhD blood groups among blood donors in Hong Kong” (1), has been warmly received by readers. Have there been any new insights regarding the topic that you can share with us since its publication?
Dr. Lee: I am thankful for the editorial board for accepting our work. As there is racial and regional difference, ongoing surveillance of this relatively simple work remains relevant in blood service and clinical transfusion. At the same time, there is also a need to study other locally or regional important blood groups and their alloantibodies for example, Mia and anti-Mia in Chinese population.
AOB: Currently, your team is actively working on raising awareness and knowledge on blood supply, blood transfusion, and patient blood management. What are some existing knowledge gaps in these areas that spurred your team to start this initiative?
Dr. Lee: Though I am working as a blood supplier, my professional career remains a doctor who looks after patients and their outcomes. Therefore, I am concerned about whether patients’ outcomes could be improved by whatever means like introduction of better drugs, target therapy for cancer and in this scenario, patient blood management. I consider that patient blood management is not contradictory to the scope of work of blood service. Rather, they are complementary in driving for better patient outcomes. On the other hand, the change in blood demand could diversify the use of existing resources for other meaningful developments in blood transfusion, such as the provision of better-quality blood components for patients’ needs.
AOB: What has your team done to raise awareness in these areas? What outcomes do you hope to achieve from raising awareness in these areas?
Dr. Lee: We believed it was a very good start for the territory. However, there are still a lot of ongoing works in particular related to the upcoming WHO Implementation Guidance on Patient Blood Management. In the last eight years or so, we have done many works from raising the awareness and knowledge of patient blood management in both public and private hospitals, development of Corporate Patient Blood Management Steering Committee and policies, introduction of better therapy and Point-of-Care Testing (POCT), and last but not the least the development of clinical indicators for baseline and monitoring of changes with patient blood management, comprehensive education, and awareness program for clinicians, etc.
AOB: How has your experience been as an Editorial Board Member of AOB?
Dr. Lee: It is my pleasure to be part of the team.
AOB: As an Editorial Board Member, what are your expectations for AOB?
Dr. Lee: I hope to see more submissions and publications not only regionally but also globally.
Reference
- Ng YW, Tong CY, Tsoi WC, Lee CK. Frequencies of ABO and RhD blood groups among blood donors in Hong Kong. Ann Blood. 2023;8:33.