Quality control in tissue banking-Ensuring the safety of allograft tissues

ABSTRACT
- DESPITE FEDERAL REGULATIONS for tissue-banking practices, inadequate quality control led to the largest allograft tissue recall in history in October 2005.
- THE RECALL INCLUDED all allograft tissues obtained from 761 donors and distributed by five tissue banks. Many of these tissues already had been implanted and were unrecoverable.
- THIS ARTICLE DESCRIBES the many tissue-banking industry variables, including donor selection and testing and tissue recovery, processing, and preservation.
- QUESTIONS THAT HEALTH CARE providers can ask to determine which tissue banks' quality control measures best ensure the safety of the allografts they provide also are included. AORN J 84 (September 2006) 386-398 © AORN, Inc, 2006.