STORAGE AND HOMOLOGOUS SERUM JAUNDICE

To the Editor:—  The absence of risk of homologous serum jaundice as shown by J. Garrott Allen and associates (J. A. M. A.154:103 [Jan. 9] 1954) by preservation of liquid plasma for six months is a matter of great therapeutic interest. During the years 1948-1951, I had a similar experience with lyophilized plasma. Sixty containers of Red Cross plasma collected during the war had been left in an abandoned Coast Guard dispensary on Cape Hatteras where the temperatures during the summer reach a subtropical high. Although the expiration date had passed, situations arose in which plasma was needed desperately. All 60 containers of two units each were eventually used. Not a singlecase of transfusion hepatitis or other complication developed. After this experience, I talked with a medical officer who had served in the Pacific and who, under similar circumstances, had used lyophilized plasma that had passed the expiration