Association between recipient survival and blood donor age after blood transfusion in a surgery intensive care unit: a multicenter randomized controlled trial study protocol

BACKGROUND: Blood from younger individuals has been shown to improve physiological function in recipients in laboratory research, and many proteins from human peripheral blood show antisenescence capabilities. Thus, researchers have questioned whether blood from young donors is superior to blood from older donors. Blood transfusion is a key supportive therapy for trauma patients, and recent studies have reported the influence of blood donor age on recipient patient prognosis. Although some retrospective results found that blood from young donors improves survival, no influence of blood donor age was observed on outcomes in other study groups. The reasons for this discrepancy are complicated, but the fact that data were not obtained from randomized controlled trial (RCT) data should be considered. The current protocol and analysis method provide a feasible RCT design to evaluate the prognosis of severely ill surgery patients who were transfused with blood products from blood donors of different ages. METHODS: The current study is a pragmatic multicenter RCT (open, parallel-group, non-masked, superiority trial). Recruited surgery intensive care unit patients will be randomized into three groups and transfused with blood products from male donors of different ages (< 25, 25–45, and > 45 years). Survival time will be measured within 28 days. The survival characteristics, possible interaction between variables, and potential factors associated with death will be analyzed by Kaplan–Meier analysis, two-way ANOVA, and Cox proportional hazards model, respectively. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ChiCTR: ChiCTR190002. Registered on 22 March 2019. http://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.aspx?proj=36867.