Posted by By Jeff Francis on
Dr. Michael Ruxin, a Lakewood businessman, is doing his part to stem the AIDS epidemic in Nigeria.
Dr. Michael Ruxin, a Lakewood businessman, is doing his part to stem the AIDS epidemic in Nigeria.
Ruxin's company, Global Med Technologies, which he founded in 1995, recently signed a contract with the Nigerian government to monitor its blood supply and try to stop accidental transfusions of blood contaminated with AIDS.
"In the sub-Sahara in Africa, there are about 6 million transfusions, and about half of them aren't screened," Ruxin said. "It's estimated that 10 to 30 percent of AIDS cases happen through transmissions of AIDS-tainted blood. You're basically just recycling AIDS through the blood supply."
Wyndgate Technologies, a California subsidiary of Global Med, will develop systems to track blood from donation to transfusion.
"We have a donor system, SafeTrace, that manages and tracks blood from the time it's donated to the manufacturing process at the blood center to the hospital," Ruxin said. "During the entire process we're providing SafeTrace via satellite to donor centers and hospitals in Nigeria."
Another player in the Nigerian arrangement is the Colorado-based Bonfils Blood Center, which has locations in Lakewood and Golden.
Bonfils is using software from its subsidiary, Hemo-Net, to provide computer support, database management and monitoring to the operation.
"In Nigeria, there are often power outages and whatnot where the system goes down," said Paige Van Riper, spokeswoman for Bonfils. "With Hemo-Net, they can still access the information through a satellite connection."
Although much of the work between Global Med and Hemo-Net amounts to information gathering, the move hopefully will save lives by reversing the spread of AIDS and hepatitis B and C through transfusions.
"This has replaced the manual record-keeping system with an automated solution," Van Riper said. "You don't have as much potential for human error with this software."