Nationwide questionnaire survey on transfusion medicine has been conducted over a period of 10 years or more as a project commissioned by the Japanese government. When the survey was initiated, the goals of the project were to establish a blood transfusion management system and to reduce the usage of albumin preparations and freshfrozen plasma (FFP). The blood transfusion management system has been improved by the measures taken by the national government, including the introduction of a blood

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... ransfusion management fee, as well as by an accreditation system established by academic societies. As a result, the waste rate of blood products has decreased. Regarding usage, the use of albumin preparations and FFP has rapidly decreased to the internationally agreed level through the development of criteria for the appropriate use of blood products, and through the publication of evidence-based guidelines on the use of blood products by academic societies. The results of the present survey clearly showed that blood products are used appropriately and safely in transfusion medicine in Japan. However, newly identified issues are the need to evaluate the actual use of immunoglobulin preparations, which has rapidly increased in recent years, and to ascertain the use of individual blood products by medical specialty and blood transfusion site.