A landmark Australian research trial has found the transfusion of older stored red blood cells is safe and surprisingly, associated with fewer side effects. In the TRANSFUSE trial, researchers from the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Research Centre at Monash University in Melbourne led teams in 5 countries to investigate the effect of the age of transfused red blood cells on critically ill patient's outcomes. In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on September 27th, the team demonstrated that fresher blood was no better than older blood.
Unexpectedly, they also found fewer transfusion reactions, including fever, with the older blood; and in the most severely ill patients, the transfusion of older blood was associated with fewer deaths. Lead researcher, Professor said "older blood appears to be like a good red wine- better with some age. The findings of…
