An assessment of the risk, cost-effectiveness, and perceived benefits of anti-parvovirus B19 tested blood products.

Background: Parvovirus B19 (B19V) can cause severe anemia, hydrops foetalis, and even death in vulnerable patients. To prevent transfusion-transmitted B19V infection of at-risk patients, B19V antibody screening of blood donors was implemented. The cost-effectiveness of this intervention is unclear, as the likelihood of transmission through blood and subsequent complications for recipients are unknown.

Why was this transfusion given? Identifying clinical indications for blood transfusion in health care data.

Background: To enhance the utility of transfusion data for research, ideally every transfusion should be linked to a primary clinical indication. In electronic patient records, many diagnostic and procedural codes are registered, but unfortunately, it is usually not specified which one is the reason for transfusion. Therefore, a method is needed to determine the most likely indication for transfusion in an automated way.

Validation of multisource electronic health record data: an application to blood transfusion data.

Background: Although data from electronic health records (EHR) are often used for research purposes, systematic validation of these data prior to their use is not standard practice. Existing validation frameworks discuss validity concepts without translating these into practical implementation steps or addressing the potential influence of linking multiple sources. Therefore we developed a practical approach for validating routinely collected data from multiple sources and to apply it to a blood transfusion data warehouse to evaluate the usability in practice.

Protocol for a national blood transfusion data warehouse from donor to recipient.

Introduction: Blood transfusion has health-related, economical and safety implications. In order to optimise the transfusion chain, comprehensive research data are needed. The Dutch Transfusion Data warehouse (DTD) project aims to establish a data warehouse where data from donors and transfusion recipients are linked.

Aiming for a representative sample: Simulating random versus purposive strategies for hospital selection.

Background: A ubiquitous issue in research is that of selecting a representative sample from the study population. While random sampling strategies are the gold standard, in practice, random sampling of participants is not always feasible nor necessarily the optimal choice. In our case, a selection must be made of 12 hospitals (out of 89 Dutch hospitals in total).