Fever related to ABO blood use in major oral and maxillofacial surgery

Background: Blood transfusion, a critical life-saving procedure, is associated with side effects such as fever. Objectives: To determine the pattern of distribution of transfused blood groups among patients with postoperative fever after major oral surgery. Patients and Methods: This is a 1-year prospective study of patients that developed fever after major oral and maxillofacial surgery, with or without receiving ABO blood transfusion. Criteria for inclusion include those booked for oral and maxillofacial surgery and without any serious medical conditions. The confounding variables evaluated were divided into clinical and demographic parameters. Both univariate and bivariate statistics were computed. Results: Of the 108 patients, 23 (21.3%) met the criteria for diagnosis of postoperative fever. The majority (82.6%) of the patients were within 40 years of age. There were 17 males and 6 females with a male-to-female ratio of 2.8:1. Majority (60.9%; P = 0.021) of the patients having benign and malignant tumors needed blood transfusion. The study showed 78.3% of patients developed fever after blood transfusion, whereas 21.7% who did not receive transfusion also had postoperative fever. Group O Rhesus D positive blood group was the most common type transfused (P = 0.01), mostly in patients who had malignant lesions, and transfusion was done mainly intraoperatively. The majority (73.9%) of the fever occurred in patients within 24 h after transfusion, lasting for 1 day (P = 0.01). Conclusion: A significant association between the transfusion of blood and the development of postoperative fever, as well as fever occurring more frequently with increased units of blood transfused, was noticed. The outcome suggests blood transfusion is a risk factor for postoperative fever in patients after major oral surgery.