Patient Blood Management in postpartum haemorrhage: a narrative review and expert opinion towards improving patient outcomes during pregnancy and childbirth.

Abstract

Patient Blood Management (PBM) aims to improve patient outcomes by optimising, managing and preserving a patient's own blood. There is an urgent need for PBM implementation in obstetrics for postpartum haemorrhage, since its application is associated with improvements in patient outcomes. We outline the principles of PBM, summarise recent postpartum haemorrhage management guidelines and share our clinical perspectives from experience within high-resource clinical settings in Europe. We provide practical recommendations to promote PBM in postpartum haemorrhage and discuss the key challenges facing PBM implementation in obstetrics. To aid the uptake of PBM strategies in obstetrics, we developed an algorithm for management of anaemia in pregnancy and created a quick reference chart for PBM strategies that can be employed in postpartum haemorrhage scenarios.