Non-infectious Consequences of Blood Transfusions and Blood Donation
 

Examples include a series of studies to document persistent microchimerism of donor cells in transfusion recipients, with particular focus on mechanisms and clinical relevance of donor stem cell microchimerism in transfused trauma patients, and the immunological mechanisms and prevention of transfusion-related acute lung injury (TRALI) and alloimmunization. I have also been involved in multiple studies of donor reactions and donor iron loss, and am now leading a large NHLBI-funded study (RBC-Omics) investigating genetic and metabolomic mechanisms underlying differing capacity of donors from diverse racial-ethnic groups to tolerate frequent RBC donation and of their donated RBC to maintain functional integrity during storage for 42 days.

Selected Publications:

Lee T-H, Paglieroni T, Ohto H, Holland PV, Busch MP. Survival of Donor Leukocyte Subpopulations in Immunocompetent Transfusion Recipients: Frequent Long-Term Microchimerism in Severe Trauma Patients. Blood, 93(9):3127-39, 1999.

Utter GH, Lee T-H, Nathens AB, Reed WF, Owings JT, Nester TA, Busch MP. Leukoreduction of Blood Transfusions Does Not Diminish Transfusion-Associated Microchimerism in Trauma Patients. Transfusion, 46(11):1863-1869, 2006.

Carrick DM, Norris PJ, Endres, Pandey S, Kleinman S, Wright D, Sun Y, Busch MP. Establishing Assay Cutoffs for HLA Antibody Screening of Apheresis Donors. Transfusion, 51(10):2092-2101,2011.

Mold JE, Michaƫlsson J, Burt TD, Muench MO, Beckerman KP, Busch MP, Lee T-H, Nixon DF, McCune JM. Maternal Alloantigens Promote the Development of Tolerogenic Fetal Regulatory T Cells in utero. Science, 332:1562-1565, 2008