Blood Conservation in Adult Cardiac Surgery

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    Blood Conservation in Adult Cardiac Surgery: What is the way forward in today’s practice?

  • IRAS ID

    134964

  • Contact name

    Reuben Jeganathan

  • Contact email

    reuben.jeganathan@belfasttrust.hscni.net

  • Sponsor organisation

    Belfast Health and Social Care Trust

  • Research summary

    This is a research project looking at minimising blood transfusion requirements for all patients undergoing adult cardiac surgery. It involves two techniques which are currently available for patients and used in cardiac surgery. One is the use of cell salvage, which is a red blood cell washing device that collects anticoagulated shed during an operation and separates out the red blood cells by centrifugation so that they can be re-transfused back to the patient in preference to donated blood. The second is a technique to change the prime solution in the bypass machine used for heart surgery to the patients' own blood rather than a saline solution to avoid the consequential dilutional effects this has on the patients' blood count. A randomised controlled trial will compare their efficacy both in combination, alone, and without any intervention. No literature comparing these two methods is currently published. Currently the transfusion rate for patients undergoing adult cardiac surgery is 50% and we hope to reduce this to less than 30%.

  • REC name

    HSC REC B

  • REC reference

    14/NI/0021

  • Date of REC Opinion

    25 Jun 2014

  • REC opinion

    Further Information Favourable Opinion