| 摘要 |
Apparatus (10) and method are disclosed for quickly, efficiently and with minimum human contact removing the contents of flexible or collapsible containers (12), for example, frozen blood (24) from the plastic pouches (12) in which it is collected from human donors. The container (12) is positioned and retained between a pair of plates (14, 16) which are relatively movable to compress the container (12) to discharge the contents. The plates (14, 16) are preferably mounted on a continuous conveyor (18) for automatically moving the container (12) from a loading station where the container is inserted between the plates (14, 16), to an opening area where a portion (47) of the container (12) is removed to provide access to the contents (24), and from there to a compression posiwhere the plates (14, 16) are forced together to discharge the contents (24) from the container (12) through the access opening. For frozen contents, the plates (14, 16) and container (12) may also pass through a thawing area (82) where the container (12) is heated sufficiently to free it from the frozen contents (24). |
