Effects of storage duration of suspended red blood cells before intraoperative infusion on coagulation indexes, routine blood examination and immune function in patients with gastrointestinal tumors

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of storage duration of suspended red blood cells (SRBC) before intraoperative infusion on coagulation indexes, routine blood examination and immune function in patients with gastrointestinal (GI) tumors. METHODS: We divided clinical data of one hundred patients with GI tumors who underwent surgical treatment in our hospital into two different groups according to the storage duration of SRBC use for intraoperative infusion. The short-term group (n=50) had patients with SRBC storage durations shorter than two weeks, and the long-term group (n=50) had patients with storage durations longer than two weeks. We compared the coagulation, immune function, routine blood profile, electrolyte levels and adverse reactions assessment results between the two groups. RESULTS: Compared with before transfusions, the levels of fibrinogen (FIB) and activated partial prothrombin time (APTT) after blood transfusions were higher than those before transfusion (P<0.05). The levels of hemoglobin (Hb) and hematocrit (HCT) in the two groups after blood transfusions were also higher than those before transfusion (P<0.05). However, the levels of CD4(+) decreased and those of CD8(+) increased in both groups after the blood transfusions. In addition, the levels of CD4(+) and CD4(+)/CD8(+) in the short-term group were higher than those of the long-term group (P<0.05) while the CD8(+) levels were lower than that of the long-term group (P<0.05). After the blood transfusions, the potassium ion (K(+)) levels in the two groups increased, and those in the long-term group were higher than in the short-term group (P<0.05). The sodium ion (Na(+)) levels in the two groups increased after the transfusions, and the short-term group had higher levels than the long-term group (P<0.05). Finally, the incidence of adverse reactions in the short-term group (4.00%) was lower than that in the long-term group (18.00%) (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: Intraoperative infusion of SRBC with storage duration longer than two weeks increases the risk of perioperative adverse transfusion reactions, which implies that the storage duration of SRBC should be strictly controlled in clinical practice to reduce the risk of blood transfusion.