Plan speeds babies' blood tests

Screenings identify disorders that need quick treatment

State health leaders took the first step to reduce the amount of time it takes for families to find out if their children have disorders that require immediate treatment.

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The Arkansas Board of Health preliminarily approved changes to newborn blood-screening regulations that would require hospitals to send the samples to the state laboratory within one business day of the samples being collected. The rules currently allow facilities to wait up to 48 hours before sending them.

The new rules will be reviewed by a state legislative committee. If approved, they will return to the Board of Health for a final vote.

States across the nation are trying to reduce the time it takes to get infant blood screens done, said Dr. Glen Baker, director of the Arkansas Department of Health's Public Health Laboratory.

"It surfaced as a problem several months ago," Baker said. "They started looking at it and found that in many states, samples were not being submitted in a timely manner."

An article by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in November exposed serious delays in infant blood screening across the country.

The sooner the screens are done, the sooner doctors can start treating the babies' diseases -- a move that could prevent serious disability or death, health professionals said.

"We're dealing with conditions that are very time sensitive," said state Department of Health spokesman Kerry Krell.

In Arkansas, one baby's blood sample was not tested until 3 1/2 weeks after his birth in 2011, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

The baby, Aiden Cooper, who was born in Paragould, was then diagnosed with galactosemia, a treatable disorder that prevented him from digesting glucose, a sugar found in both breast milk and traditional formula.

Galactosemia is treatable, but by the time the test results came back damage had already been done.

Baker said that once his lab receives the samples, it has five days to test them and report back to the hospital.

The state Department of Health has been working with Arkansas hospitals to educate them about the importance of submitting the blood samples quickly, Krell said. She said department staff members are closely monitoring the time it takes the screens to be collected and submitted to the lab.

"Whenever they find a hospital that is having trouble, they go to the hospital and work with the staff," she said.

The lab tests for 28 different diseases. If the new regulations pass, it will test for a 29th, too -- severe combined immunodeficiency, known as SCID.

"We're going to add that as soon as FDA approves the test that we use and we get funding for it," Baker said.

Babies with SCID fail to develop an immune system, making them highly vulnerable to infectious diseases. Left untreated, they may die within their first year of life, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The CDC reports that only 16 states screen for the disease.

The addition of SCID to the list of tests would increase the price of the screening process. Baker said the amount of the increase hasn't been finalized.

Metro on 07/25/2014

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