"Quotes"

Simple One-liners

“Transfused blood can be harmful.”
Dr. Jonathan Stamler, Duke University Medical Center

“A lot of transfusions are just capricious.”
Robert L. Thurer, MD, American College of Chest Physicians in Orlando

“Blood conservation is a global movement.”
Dr Vivek Jawali, Director of Wockhardt Hospitals and Chief Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgeon

“Transfusion has…. never been FDA-tested.”
Bruce Spiess, Anesthesiologist and Transfusion expert - Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center

“A blood transfusion is a liquid organ transplant.”
Dr. Spence, Chief of Surgery at St. Agnes HealthCare

"Clearly, the safest transfusion is the one not given.”
The Surgery Annual

"The truth is, I don't like to see blood, I never have.”
Dr. Francisca Velcek, – Bloodless Surgeon, Chief Of Pediatric Surgery, Long Island College Hospital

“I felt the overriding issue was one of patient choice.”
Dr Stephen Pollard, Director of Liver Transplantation at St James's Hospital in Leeds

“Transfusions should be avoided whenever possible.”
Colleen Gorman Koch, M.D., M.S., from the Cleveland Clinic Foundation

“We can save lives by being frugal in our use of blood.”
Debra L. Malone, MD, FACS, The University of Maryland School of Medicine

“Stored blood is impaired in its ability to deliver oxygen.”
Dr Jonathan Stamler - Duke University Medical Center

“There is little doubt that transfused blood can be harmful.”
Dr. Jonathan Stamler, Duke University

“Banked blood [Is] not the same as the blood in the body.”
Duke Med News Oct 8. 2007

“[Blood] is the most dangerous substance we use in medicine.”  
Dr. Charles B Huggins, Nobel Prize Recipient

“Treating anemia is the best way to avoid blood transfusions.”
Mary Ann Rouch, Blood Conservation Program Coordinator, Presbyterian Hospital of Plano

“Blood may not do as much good for you as we once thought.”
Dr. Norman Smyke, Grant Medical Center

“The cancer surgeon may need to become a bloodless surgeon.”
Dr. John S. Spratt, The American Journal of Surgery, issue of September 1986

“Even fresh blood may have… adverse biological characteristics.”
Dr. Timothy McMohan Ph.D

“Everything in health care can be done without blood (transfusions).”
Dr. Aryeh Shander, Engle Wood Hospital

“Blood transfusion has often been shown to reduce cancer survival.”
British Journal of Surgery Volume 89 June 2002

“Blood… is sometimes used cavalierly when it need not be given at all.”
Oct. 01, 1997 Time Magazine

“The benefits of transfusion have not been adequately demonstrated.”
James Rawn, M.D., of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston

“Blood and blood products are commonly over-used in hospital practice.”
Francesco Torella, FRCS et al

“There’s this notion that ‘it’s just blood—how problematic can it be?’”
David Reardon, MD, medical director of laboratories at Lee Memorial Health System

“Blood transfusions with banked human blood could do more harm than good.”
Duke Med News Oct 8. 2007

“Banked human blood may do more harm than good for a majority of patients.”
Duke Med News Oct 8. 2007

“Over 3000 articles are in the literature delineating the risks of blood transfusion.”
Ann Thorac Surg 2002;74:986-987

“Despite the prevalence of transfusion, there is scant evidence of its effectiveness.”
Deborah Josefson Nebraska, BMJ 2002;325:735 (5 October)

"The research supporting prudent use of blood transfusions is continuing to grow."
Joseph E. Parrillo, MD, editor-in-chief of Critical Care Medicine

“An increasing number of physicians are taking a harder look at bloodless medicine.”
John Langone, Time Magazine, Oct. 01, 1997

“The number of infections per patient increased with each unit of blood transfused.”
Results from data on 666 acutely burned patients with burns involving more than 20% of their bodies

“If blood transfusions were optimally effective, it would become a tactic of first resort.”
Darren Swan, Medill Reports

“We have been able to reduce blood transfusions for cancer patients by 90 percent.”
Daniel Burzon, M.D., Director of Bloodless Surgery at Ocean Medical Center

“Let the patient decide, because it is the patient who must live with the consequences.”
J. Mervyn Thomas, MB, Nanaimo Regional General Hospital Nanaimo, BC  

“Transfusions are like getting a transplant; they can be risky and should be a last resort.”
Dr. Patricia Ford, Pennsylvania Hospital

“Bloodless surgery is also preferable to having patients transfused with their own blood.”
Dr. Charles Bridges, Cardiologist, Pennsylvania Hospital

“Many institutions are not routinely offering all blood management choices to all patients.”
Sazama K., The ethics of blood management. Vox Sang 2007;92:95-102

“We have enough skills along with latest technology that we can do surgery without blood.”
Mary Ann Rouch, Blood Conservation Program Coordinator, Presbyterian Hospital of Plano

“It [is] likely that the demise of the blood transfusion as a therapy [will] take place in the next three decades.” 
Dr. Ivor Cavill, senior fellow -  Haematology, Cardiff University

“Patients who received blood transfusions had higher rates of heart attack, heart failure, stroke, and even death.”
Duke Med News Oct 8. 2007

“The issue of transfused blood being potentially harmful to patients is one of the biggest problems facing American medicine.”
Dr. Jonathan Stamler, Duke University Medical Center

“It is difficult to identify patients in whom transfusion is truly necessary on the basis of hematocrit, age, or comorbidity.”
Gavin J. Murphy, M.D., University of Bristol

“If red blood cells were a new drug today, it would be very difficult to get it licensed.”
Dr. Jeffrey McCullough, Editor of the journal Transfusion

“Blood transfusion does not always improve oxygen delivery and is associated with ischemic events.”
James D. Reynolds et al, PNAS

“Poorly deformable transfused red blood cells cause micro-circulatory occlusion in some organs.”
P. E. Marik and W. J. Sibbald, JAMA

“Red cell transfusion does not increase oxygen consumption in septic patients in an intensive care unit.”
Dr. R. J. Frumento et al Crit Care. 2001 Dec;5(6):362-7.

“I think we are on the point of seeing quite a radical change in people's attitudes to blood transfusion.”
Dr. Ivor Cavill, Senior Fellow in Haematology, Cardiff University

“[The] medical establishment [has] have been hard-wired to see transfusions only as a life-saving tool.”
Dr. Irwin Gross, Director, EMMC Blood Conservation Program