This work demonstrates a great potential for cross-cohort collaboration addressing important aspects of child health. The web site, http://www.birthcohorts.net, proved to be a useful tool for accessing information on European pregnancy and birth cohorts and their characteristics.

Background Disquieting reports of increased complication and death rates after transfusions of red-cell concentrates stored for more than 14 days prompted us to perform an observational retrospective cohort study of mortality in relation to storage time. Study design and methods We conducted a cohort study utilizing data on all recipients of at least one red-cell transfusion in Sweden and Denmark between 1995 and 2002, as recorded in the Scandinavian donations and Transfusions (SCANDAT) database. Relative risks of death in relation to storage time were estimated using Cox regression, adjusted for several possible confounding factors. Results After various exclusions, 402,874 transfusion episodes remained for analysis. The 7 day risk of death was similar in all exposure groups, but a tendency for a higher risk emerged among recipients of blood stored for 30-42 days (hazard ratio, 1.05; 95% CI, 0.97-1.12), as compared to recipients of blood stored for 10-19 days. With 2-year follow-up, this excess remained at the same level (hazard ratio, 1.05; 95% CI, 1.02-1.08). No dose-response pattern was revealed and no differential effect was seen when the analyses were restricted to recipients of leukocyte depleted units only. Conclusion Although a small excess mortality was noted in recipients of the oldest red-cell concentrates, the risk pattern was more consistent with weak confounding than with an effect of the momentary exposure to stored red-cell concentrates. It seems, thus, that any excess mortality conferred by older red-cells in the combined Swedish and Danish transfusion recipient population is likely less than 5%, which is considerably smaller than in the hitherto largest investigation.