Jehovah’s Witnesses Blood Transfusion Confusion

Madison Country Courier ^ | 16 September 2011 | Margo

[Cronos]

Ah, so you do think blood transfusion is necessary at times — good. Then you would disagree with the Jehovah’s witness philosophy on this, correct?

[count-your-change]

see my last post.

[Cronos]

Good, so you disagree with the Jehovah’s witness philosophy that blood transfusions are never necessary, correct?

[count-your-change]

Then you know very little about the subject you’re making these broad pronouncements about who is right and who is wrong and what is necessary and when. What is a ‘lot of blood loss’? When the blood count is 6, 5, 3< ? “or the person will die”.

Just one heart surgeon, Denton Cooley of world renown, performed hundreds of open heart surgeries without transfusions. and they are being performed every day. In fact every kind of surgery is being done on all ages without transfusions. I believe I mentioned a couple earlier, if not I will. To the second part of my question, I guess you didn’t understand it so I’ll supply an answer for you.

From the JAMA 2010 (partial quote) Variation in Use of Blood Transfusion in Coronary Artery Bypass Graft SurgeryElliott Bennett-Guerrero, MD; Yue Zhao, PhD; Sean M. O’Brien, PhD; T. B. Ferguson, Jr, MD; Eric D. Peterson, MD, MPH; James S. Gammie, MD; Howard K. Song, MD, PhD [+] Author Affiliations Author Affiliations: Divisions of Perioperative Clinical Research (Dr Bennett-Guerrero), Biostatistics (Drs Zhao and O’Brien), and Cardiology (Dr Peterson), Duke Clinical Research Institute, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina; Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, East Carolina Heart Institute, Greenville, North Carolina (Dr Ferguson); Division of Cardiac Surgery, University of Maryland Medical Center, Baltimore (Dr Gammie); and Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland (Dr Song). Corresponding Author: Elliott Bennett-Guerrero, MD, Division of Perioperative Clinical Research, Duke Clinical Research Institute, Duke University Medical Center, PO Box 3094, Durham, NC 27710 (elliott.bennettguerrero@duke.edu).

More author information Next Section Abstract Context

Perioperative blood transfusions are costly and have safety concerns. As a result, there have been multiple initiatives to reduce transfusion use. However, the degree to which perioperative transfusion rates vary among hospitals is unknown.
Objective To assess hospital-level variation in use of allogeneic red blood cell (RBC), fresh-frozen plasma, and platelet transfusions in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery. Design, Setting, and Patients An observational cohort of 102 470 patients undergoing primary isolated CABG surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass during calendar year 2008 at 798 sites in the United States, contributing data to the Society of Thoracic Surgeons Adult Cardiac Surgery Database.
Main Outcome Measures Perioperative (intraoperative and postoperative) transfusion of RBCs, fresh-frozen plasma, and platelets. Results At hospitals performing at least 100 on-pump CABG operations (82 446 cases at 408 sites), the rates of blood transfusion ranged from 7.8% to 92.8% for RBCs, 0% to 97.5% for fresh-frozen plasma, and 0.4% to 90.4% for platelets.
Multivariable analysis including data from all 798 sites (102470 cases) revealed that after adjustment for patient-level risk factors, hospital transfusion rates varied by geographic location (P = .007), academic status (P = .03), and hospital volume (P < .001). However, these 3 hospital characteristics combined only explained 11.1% of the variation in hospital risk-adjusted RBC usage. Case mix explained 20.1% of the variation between hospitals in RBC usage.
Conclusion Wide variability occurred in the rates of transfusion of RBCs and other blood products, independent of case mix, among patients undergoing CABG surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass in US hospitals in an adult cardiac surgical database.
KEYWORDS: BLOOD TRANSFUSION, CORONARY ARTERY BYPASS, ERYTHROCYTE TRANSFUSION, HOSPITALS. Patients who undergo cardiac surgery receive a significant proportion of the 14 million units of allogeneic red blood cells (RBCs) transfused annually in the United States.
Numerous observational studies in patients who underwent cardiac surgery have shown an association between RBC transfusion and adverse outcome, including morbidity, mortality, resource utilization, and quality of life.

To date, no large randomized trials of transfusion thresholds have been conducted in cardiac surgery to our knowledge to address this issue.”

Here is the salient sentence here:
“Numerous observational studies in patients who underwent cardiac surgery have shown an association between RBC transfusion and adverse outcome, including morbidity, mortality, resource utilization, and quality of life.”

You do understand what is being said there, don’t you?

Or I could go to a study(Oct. 8’07)done at Duke Medicine that said, among other things, that banked blood (transfusions) may do the majority of patients more harm than good as physicians are just beginning to appreciate.

But you can say for a fact what is necessary. And in addition who is right and wrong. Really?

[count-your-change]

You have a source that confirms your statement:
“...the Jehovah’s witness philosophy that blood transfusions are never necessary...”?

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Not what I said. Need help with the English?

[Cronos]

That was a question —> do you agree or disagree with the Jehovah’s witness philosophy that blood transfusions are never necessary?

[Cronos]

yes -- go to http://www.ajwrb.org.

[count-your-change]

You haven't established that your assumption is anything but that...an assumption and furthermore you have refused to go a site that might give an authoritative answer.

It is not my job to do for you what you refuse to do!

[Cronos]

Actually it is you who refuse to go to a site that will point out that your Jehovah’s Witness beliefs on blood transfusion are false.

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Try Watchtower.org. It’s an official site. Took about 3 seconds to find it.

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I do not and will not rely on someone’s blog to provide information about belief and practices that is available at an official site or approved as such as a source.

[CodeToad]

JW is a cult every bit as much as the Mormons. They don’t even celebrate a person’s birthday because “It’s not in the Bible and we only celebrate Jesus.”

[CodeToad]

“Are you a physician who has treated people with very low blood counts?”

Are you?

[count-your-change]

No.

[Natural Law]

"So, do you retract your statement that abortion is the same as blood transfusion?"

You can easily resolve the issue that you are (or are sympathetic to) Jehovah's Witness by providing answers to a few simple questions:

1. Do you believe in the Trinity?
2. Do you believe in Omnipresence of God?
3. Do you believe in Deity of Christ?
4. Do you believe in the dual nature of Christ, that He was both fully man and fully God?
5. Do you believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ?
6. Do you believe in the visible return of Christ?
7. Do you believe in the person of God the Holy Spirit?
8. Do you believe all are called to Salvation and the Promise of Heaven is open to to all believers?
9. Do you believe in the necessity of Baptism for all believers?
10. Do you believe in the conscious Eternal Punishment of the lost (hell)?

[count-your-change]

My response to you is as always No Response.

[ErnBatavia]

[Natural Law]

"My response to you is as always No Response."

Fine by me, I don't really care what heresy you are following. But I do note, however, when you have an answer that you think serves your purposes you do not hesitate to reply. No answer is as revealing as any answer.

Perhaps another Freeper will ask you to get this cleared up.

[count-your-change]

#77