Transfusion
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study Comparative Study Clinical Trial
Number of RBC units and rate of transfusionto anemic HIV-positive patients assigned to receiveWBC-reduced or non-WBC-reduced RBCs: the viral activation transfusion study experience.
It is known that the use of filtration to reduce WBCs in RBC units is associated with a 6- to 15-percent loss of RBCs. It is not known if the use of such WBC-reduced RBCs results in an increased need for RBC units or in the transfusion of more units per year to patients with anemia. ⋯ This study confirms that WBC-reduced RBC units are significantly lighter in weight than non-WBC-reduced RBCs. However, in the setting of a large, randomized, blinded study of transfusion for anemia, the smaller size of the WBC-reduced RBC units had no significant effect on the number of RBC units transfused or on the rate at which RBC units were used. In this study, the frequency of blood transfusion may have had a greater relationship to the frequency of routine, scheduled appointments or transfusion orders for a specified Hb trigger than to the actual Hb content of the unit.