Autologous Blood Transfusion in Total Knee Arthroplasty in Rheumatoid Arthritis.

We have performed 39 autologous blood transfusions in 26 rheumatoid arthritis patients who had a total knee arthroplasty (TKA). The patients were divided into 4 groups. Seven patients had the transfusion using the leap-frog method without erythropioetin (epo), 13 cases were simple predeposition without epo, 10 cases used the leap-frog method with epo, and 9 cases were simple predeposition with epo. Simple pre-deposition was used together with the postoperative autologous transfusion system. Epo was very effective in rheumatoid patients who had severe anemia, but autologous blood could be collected without epo in those who had a Hb of more than 11.5g/dl and if the postoperative autologous transfusion system was used, we could perform TKA at a predeposition of 600ml.