Hemotherapy treats patients' diseases and clinical conditions using human blood or its components, such as red blood cells, platelets, and plasma. Among the techniques used are blood transfusion, therapeutic bleeding, therapeutic apheresis and Hematopoietic Progenitor Cell (HPC) transplantation.
Transfusion is a method of blood replacement that may be needed during surgical procedures, chemotherapy treatments or for conditions such as anemia. Therapeutic bleedings, on the other hand, are blood removal procedures that help in the treatment of diseases such as hemochromatosis, polycythemia vera and polyglobulia (increase in red blood cell mass), which manifest as a result of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease or post-renal transplantation.
Therapeutic apheresis, in turn, consists of removing a substance or component from a patient's whole blood by means of cell separating equipment. This procedure helps in the treatment of cutaneous T-cell lymphomas and also in the acute and chronic rejection of solid organ transplants. Transplantation of Hematopoietic Progenitor Cells (HPC) is another hemotherapy technique indicated for the treatment of various immunological, hematological, genetic and oncological diseases. These cells, also known as stem cells, which are previously collected, are infused into a patient's vein after he or she has received high-dose chemotherapy or whole-body radiotherapy, depending on the treatment selected by the medical team.
Hospital 9 de Julho has a Hemotherapy Service with highly qualified professionals and advanced technological support. The institution, which also has a blood bank, pioneered the use of molecular biology methods to detect nucleic acids from HIV and Hepatitis B and C (NAT tests) in the serological screening of blood donors. Serological screening tests are essential to ensure blood safety.
