BBANYS October 7, 2026 Webinar - Alloantibody Exchange: 5M Patients and Counting (Wednesday, October 07, 2026)

Wed, 07 Oct 2026 19:00:00 GMT

Wednesday, October 7, 2026 / 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM EDT

Title:
Alloantibody Exchange: 5M Patients and Counting

Speaker:
R. George Hauser, MD
Yale School of Medicine

Speaker Bio:
R. George Hauser, MD, is Associate Professor of Laboratory Medicine at Yale School of Medicine, with secondary appointments in Biomedical Informatics & Data Science and in Biostatistics. He is board-certified in Clinical Pathology and Clinical Informatics, and his work centers on using data to improve medical decision-making, including blood transfusion. He has contributed transfusion-dosing calculators to MDCalc and previously served as Chief Science Officer at Biocogniv. Dr. Hauser is a founder and volunteer for the Alloantibody Exchange and serves as VA Site Director of the Yale/VA Medical Informatics Fellowship. He earned his MD at Yale and his biomedical engineering degree at the University of Michigan.

Abstract:
Alloantibodies identified at one hospital are often invisible to the next, leaving patients at risk for transfusion delays and hemolytic reactions when their history doesn't follow them. The Alloantibody Exchange closes that gap with a national service for transfusion medicine history review. Participating sites set up an automated, secure data upload, so any member site can check whether a patient has a documented antibody history elsewhere — a database that now covers more than five million patients. A recent addition lets sites share full reference laboratory reports as PDFs, so reviewers can see the original workup rather than a single summary field. This talk introduces the Exchange, walks through how records and reference lab PDFs are shared, and presents case reports showing how a more complete transfusion history changes decisions and improves patient care.

Objectives:
After this webinar, participants will be able to:

Describe the Alloantibody Exchange as a national transfusion medicine history review service, including how sites join and contribute data.
Explain how reference laboratory reports are shared as PDFs within the Exchange and how they complement structured antibody records.
Use case examples to assess how access to a more comprehensive transfusion history can improve transfusion decisions and patient safety.

Disclosures:
Dr. Hauser volunteers for the Alloantibody Exchange without direct or indirect compensation.

Pricing:

Members: FREE (Registration is required.)
Non-Members: $45 per session & $130 entire series
Institutions: $75 per session & $200 entire series

To receive member pricing, be sure to sign in.

View our calendar of upcoming events:
www.bbanys.org/events

Stay up-to-date with all the latest happenings. Follow us on:
LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram
BBANYS Podcast Series (subscribe on Spotify or Apple Podcasts)

BBANYS October 28, 2026 Webinar - Transfusion Reaction Dataset (Wednesday, October 28, 2026)

Wed, 28 Oct 2026 19:00:00 GMT

Wednesday, October 28, 2026 / 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM EDT

Title:
Transfusion Reaction Dataset

Speaker:
Nalan Yurtsever, MD
Yale School of Medicine

Speaker Bio:
Nalan Yurtsever, MD is an Assistant Professor of Laboratory Medicine at Yale University School of Medicine with expertise in transfusion medicine and apheresis. She currently serves as the Medical Director of the Clinical Laboratory at Bridgeport Hospital and Assistant Medical Director of the blood bank. Dr. Yurtsever is committed to improving laboratory quality to enhance both diagnosis and treatment. Her work aims to advance laboratory testing methods and deepen the understanding of transfusion-related challenges to improve patient outcomes.

Abstract:

Background
It is well-established that transfusion reactions are under-reported with rates being markedly lower for some serious reactions such as transfusion associated circulatory overload (TACO). We implemented a retrospective transfusion reaction alert system to enhance recognition and reporting of transfusion reactions.

Study Design and Methods
We modified an existing transfusion dataset to create a transfusion reaction alert system that flagged cases based on certain criteria and sent an email to the blood bank teams to prompt retrospective review of the case.

Results
In six-month period, the transfusion reaction dataset identified 36 previously unreported reactions across the health system with 22 being TACO reactions compared to 17 TACOs reported to the blood banks leading to 129% increase in TACO identification. Following implementation, transfusion reaction reporting at Hospital B increased from 0.627% to 0.683% and TACO identification rate showed 293% increase.

Conclusion
Targeted modification of existing resources can increase recognition and reporting of transfusion reactions.