Jehovah's Witnesses, whose faith forbids them from receiving blood transfusions, recover from heart surgery faster and with fewer complications than those who do get blood, in a study that may change thinking on current practice.
Jehovah's Witnesses patients had better survival rates, shorter hospital stays, fewer additional operations for bleeding and fewer days in the intensive care unit than those who received blood transfusions during surgery, a study Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine showed.
Members of the Jehovah's Witness faith undergo extensive blood conservation before surgery, including red blood-cell boosting erythropoietin drugs, iron and B-complex vitamins to guard against anemia. The practice offered a "unique natural experiment" for scientists to study the short- and long-term effects of the blood management strategy and may point to ways to reduce need for transfusions, researchers said.
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"How we care for Jehovah's Witness patients with this pretty extreme blood conservation doesn't put a patient at increased risk," Colleen Koch, a study author and professor of anesthesiology at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, said Monday. "Perhaps it needs to be examined more closely applying some of these practices to our routine cardiac surgery patients."
