Methods	Randomised controlled trial was conducted to investigate the influence of processing both shed mediastinal blood and residual cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) blood in patients undergoing isolated primary elective myocardial re-vascularisation. Patients were randomly allocated to intervention or control using sealed, opaque, sequentially numbered envelopes. The sequence of allocations was obtained from a computer-generated random number list. Clinicians in the Intensive Care Unit were blinded to the group
Participants	30 patients undergoing isolated primary elective myocardial re-vascularisation were randomly allocated to one of two groups: Group 1 (Autotransfusion group): n=15; M//F=13//2; mean (sd) age = 62 (11.0) years Group 2 (Control group): n=15; M//F=11//4; mean (sd) age = 66 (8.0) years
Interventions	Group 1: Autotransfusion group had their mediastinal and residual CPB blood processed by a continuous autotransfusion system (C.A.T.S. Frensenius, HemoCare) before reinfusion using the quality wash protocol. Group 2: Control group did not receive autotransfusion.
Outcomes	Outcomes reported: number of patients transfused allogeneic blood, plasma D-dimer levels
Notes
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors’ judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Low risk	Method used to generate allocation sequences was adequate.
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	High risk	Method used to conceal treatment allocation was inadequate.
Blinding (performance bias and detection bias) All outcomes	High risk	Single-blind.