Table 1.
Patient- and treatment characteristics for no transfusion group and allogeneic transfusion group (n = 789)
| Variable | No transfusion (no exposure) (n = 346) Median (interquartile range) |
Perioperative allogeneic blood transfusion* (exposure) (n = 443) Median (interquartile range) |
p value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Age (years) | 62 (53–70) | 64 (55–73) | 0.025§ |
| Modified Charlson Comorbidity Index | 6 (6–7) | 6 (6–8) | < 0.001§ |
| Preoperative hemoglobin level (g/dL†) | 12 (11–13) | 11 (10–12) | < 0.001§ |
| Total estimated blood loss during surgery (mL†) | 200 (100–300) | 300 (150–500) | < 0.001§ |
| Anesthesia time (minutes†) | 185 (153–220) | 198 (165–236) | < 0.001§ |
| Duration of hospital admission (days) | 5 (3–7) | 7 (5–11) | < 0.001§ |
| BMI (kg/m2)† | 27 (24–31) | 26 (22–29) | < 0.001§ |
| n (%) | n (%) | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Sex | |||
| Men | 180 (51) | 171 (49) | < 0.001§ |
| Women | 166 (38) | 272 (62) | |
| Primary tumor type‡ | |||
| Good prognosis | 186 (40) | 281 (60) | 0.007§ |
| Poor prognosis | 160 (50) | 162 (50) | |
| Fracture type | |||
| Impending fracture | 178 (52) | 163 (48) | < 0.001§ |
| Pathological fracture | 168 (37.5) | 280 (62.5) | |
| Fracture location | |||
| Femur | 215 (37) | 359 (63) | < 0.001§ |
| Humerus | 113 (62) | 69 (38) | |
| Tibia | 17 (61) | 11 (39) | |
| Radius | 0 (0) | 3 (100) | |
| Ulna | 1 (50) | 1 (50) | |
| Number of bone metastatic lesions | |||
| Single | 103 (55) | 84 (45) | < 0.001§ |
| Multiple | 243 (40) | 359 (60) | |
| Visceral metastases | |||
| No | 195 (47) | 224 (53) | 0.114 |
| Yes (lung, liver, or brain) | 151 (41) | 219 (59) | |
| Previous local radiotherapy | |||
| No | 282 (44) | 359 (56) | 0.927 |
| Yes | 64 (43) | 84 (57) | |
| Previous systemic therapy | |||
| No | 148 (49) | 152 (51) | 0.018§ |
| Yes | 198 (40) | 291 (60) | |
| Preoperative embolization of tumor | |||
| No | 338 (44) | 431 (56) | 0.822 |
| Yes | 8 (40) | 12 (60) | |
| Operative treatment type | |||
| Intramedullary nailing | 221 (47) | 246 (53) | < 0.001§ |
| Endoprosthetic reconstruction | 55 (30) | 129 (70) | |
| Plate-screw fixation | 61 (49) | 63 (51) | |
| Dynamic hip screw | 9 (64) | 5 (36) | |
| Year | |||
| 1999–2003 | 88 (39) | 138 (61) | 0.128 |
| 2004–2008 | 105 (43) | 137 (57) | |
| 2009–2013 | 153 (48) | 168 (52) | |
| Hospital# | |||
| Hospital 1 | 153 (45) | 188 (55) | 0.664 |
| Hospital 2 | 193 (43) | 255 (57) | |
§p < 0.05;*allogeneic blood transfusion within 7 days before until 7 days after surgery;†preoperative hemoglobin level was available for 740 patients (309 in no transfusion group, 431 in transfusion group), total estimated blood loss in 672 patients (293 in no transfusion group, 379 in transfusion group), anesthesia time for 704 patients (315 in no transfusion group, 389 in transfusion group), and BMI for 610 patients (284 in no transfusion group, 326 in transfusion group);‡primary tumor type with good prognosis includes breast, kidney, prostate, thyroid, myeloma and lymphoma and with poor prognosis includes all other tumor types; # see text for transfusion guidelines per hospital.