The chapter on transfusion reactions in Canadian Blood Services’ Clinical Guide to Transfusion, has been updated with all-new content. Chapter 10 provides transfusion medicine professionals with information on various reactions that can occur with the transfusion of blood components.

Each year, the Canadian Society for Transfusion Medicine (CSTM), in partnership with Canadian Blood Services and Héma-Québec, hosts an exciting conference for professionals in the transfusion medicine. We asked research trainees and transfusion medicine fellows to reflect on their experience attending the CSTM 2022 conference, held May 26–29 in Toronto.

The Canadian Blood Services Research Ethics Board evaluates research applications and acts as a resource to support Canadian Blood Services in maintaining ethical integrity in its research activities. The REB is currently seeking a new Volunteer Ethics Member to contribute to this multidisciplinary board.

Canadian Blood Services chief scientist, Dr. Dana Devine, attended her first meeting with the Biomedical Excellence for Safer Transfusion (BEST) Collaborative in 2002. This September, she’ll commence a four-year term as President of the international research organization.

Recent research investigating the impact that different infusion pump types have on red blood cell quality can help inform the use of these pumps for red blood cell transfusions and create a framework for their evaluation. A new Canadian Blood Services Research Unit summarizes this work undertaken by Canadian Blood Services researchers.

Two chapters in Canadian Blood Services’ Clinical Guide to Transfusion were recently updated to provide health-care providers with the latest guidance on treating patients with hemostatic disorders and hereditary angioedema. Both chapter updates, available on Canadian Blood Services’ professional education website, were completed by a team of experts led by Dr. Man-Chiu Poon, emeritus professor of medicine, pediatrics and oncology at the University of Calgary, Cumming School of Medicine.

Each year, Canadian Blood Services’ BloodTechNet award program supports innovative educational projects within the transfusion, cellular therapy, and transplantation communities. One funded project supports histocompatibility and immunogenetics laboratory (HLA lab) directors in-training to expand their learnings through educational lab rotations. Read about the experience of the first participant and the crucial role of HLA lab directors as matchmakers for patients with donated organs, tissues, stem cells and platelets.

Could clues to the successful treatment of some of the world’s most challenging viral infections come from understanding how viruses interact with our body’s clot-creating proteins? Dr. Ed Pryzdial and his laboratory team at the Centre for Blood Research (CBR) have dedicated research efforts to answering questions like this; efforts that have recently earned funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).

Red cell antigen genotyping is an important tool for healthcare providers in the development of transfusion strategies for patients, though the reports can be complex to interpret. New resources on Canadian Blood Services’ Professional Education website will assist healthcare providers in interpreting these reports, in addition to the support available from the National Immunohematology Reference Laboratory (NIRL).

New findings from University of Toronto’s QUEST research program analyze the impact of albumin on patient outcomes after cardiac surgery, suggesting routine albumin use in this patient group may need to be re-examined.