RBC biochemical and physical alterations during storage minimally affected the RBC ability to aggregate and deform, even after prolonged storage. The rheologic properties of leukoreduced RBC units were well preserved during 7 weeks of routine blood bank storage.

Although a correlation between platelet activation and in vitro parameters was observed, no correlation was found between platelet activation and in vivo parameters. Possible explanations for this are a too low variance in platelet activation in transfused PCs, and too small a number of patients.

In vitro and in vivo studies showed that LR-PCs can be stored for up to 7 days with excellent clinical results, provided that they are routinely screened for bacterial contamination.

The quality of PCs depended on whether PCs were prepared from fresh or overnight-stored whole blood and on the used PLT pooling system. The main difference between fresh and o/n PCs was the PLT count.