Effect of perioperative blood transfusion on outcome in patients with surgically resected lung cancer

Three hundred thirty patients with non-small cell lung cancer were evaluated to assess the effect of perioperative blood transfusion on overall survival and time to recurrence. One hundred sixty-nine patients received blood products during the perioperative period, and 161 received none. The mean length of follow-up was 3.6 years. There were 90 recurrences, including second primaries, and 99 deaths in the group receiving transfusion; in the group without transfusion, recurrent cancer developed in 74 patients, and 68 died. Survival comparisons, adjusted for stage and cell type using the stratified log-rank statistic, showed significant reduction in survival (p = 0.007) for patients receiving transfusion. Time to recurrence was shorter for patients receiving transfusion (p = 0.035), but became less significant when adjusted for both cell type and stage (p = 0.11). Blood transfusion within the perioperative period appears to have an adverse effect on survival and recurrence in patients undergoing surgical resection for lung cancer.