Carabini et al reported a model for predicting the need for major blood transfusion during spine fusion surgery. The authors are from Northwestern University and the American University in Beirut.
Patient selection: spine fusion surgery
Outcome: major blood transfusion defined as > 4 units of packed RBCs, plus intraoperative blood salvage
Parameters:
(1) duration of surgery in minutes
(2) number of posterior levels instrumented (from 0 to 20)
(3) surgical category (from 0 to 3, table below)
(4) pre-incision hemoglobin in g/dL
Surgery
Surgical Category
any exclusively anterior spine surgery with or without anterior cervical corpectomies (excluding anterior lumbar interbody fusions)
0
any posterior cervical or lumbar instrumentation with or without anterior cervical corpectomies
1
any surgery with lumbar posterior instrumentation with or without Smith Peterson osteotomies
2
any surgery with any combination of posterior corpectomies, pedicle subtraction osteotomies, or vertebral column resections