{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,11,12]],"date-time":"2025-11-12T21:13:42Z","timestamp":1762982022979,"version":"3.40.3"},"reference-count":26,"publisher":"American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene","issue":"4","content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":[],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2025,4,2]]},"abstract":"<jats:title>ABSTRACT.<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>Allied prisoners of war (POWs) working on the Imperial Japanese Army\u2019s railroad from Thailand to Burma during 1943\u20131945 devised a blood transfusion service to rescue severely ill fellow prisoners who were otherwise unlikely to survive the war. Extant transfusion records (1,251 recipients, 1,189 donors) in ledger books held by the United Kingdom National Archives at Kew were accessed and analyzed. Survival to the end of the war in 1945 was determined from Commonwealth War Graves Commission records. The records examined indicate that freshly donated whole blood was manually defibrinated and transfused after crossmatches based on POW medic sera. Overall survival to the end of the war was 74% in recipients and 88% in donors. Postwar survival rates were significantly higher for transfusion recipients with malaria (89.3%) than for other diagnoses: 52.6% for malnutrition, 59.3% for dysentery, 67.2% for skin ulcers, and 75.4% for other causes (odds ratio: 3.97; 95% CI: 2.79\u20135.28; <jats:italic>P<\/jats:italic> &lt;0.0001). By 1945, the vast majority of blood transfusions were given for severe anemia caused by chronic relapsing vivax malaria. Although the POW situation was admittedly extreme, our data provide evidence that blood transfusions to treat severe anemia were associated with higher survival among patients with <jats:italic>Plasmodium vivax<\/jats:italic> infection than among those with other morbidities.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.4269\/ajtmh.24-0625","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,1,14]],"date-time":"2025-01-14T16:09:05Z","timestamp":1736870945000},"page":"793-796","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["Blood Transfusions for Chronic Malaria Anemia in Prisoners of War on the Thai\u2013Burma Railway 1943\u20131945"],"prefix":"10.4269","volume":"112","author":[{"given":"Madeleine","family":"Payne","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom;"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Martin","family":"Gorsky","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom;"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Colin J.","family":"Sutherland","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom;"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"G. Dennis","family":"Shanks","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Australian Defence Force Malaria and Infectious Disease Institute, Enoggera, Australia;"},{"name":"School of Public Health, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"2795","reference":[{"key":"b1","series-title":"Med J Australia","first-page":"766","article-title":"Observations by a pathologist during three and a half years as a prisoner of war in Malaya and Thailand","volume":"1","author":"Marsden","year":"1946"},{"year":"2017","series-title":"Burma Railway Medicine: Disease, Death and Survival on the Thai\u2013Burma Railway, 1942\u20131945","author":"Gill","key":"b2"},{"year":"2015","series-title":"The Defence and Fall of Singapore","author":"Farrell","key":"b3"},{"year":"2014","series-title":"Descent into Hell: The Fall of Singapore, Pudu and Changi, the Thai Burma Railway","author":"Brune","key":"b4"},{"key":"b5","series-title":"Health History","first-page":"30","article-title":"Jungle camp science: Do-it-yourself medicines in two POW hospital camps on the Japanese Burma\u2013Thailand railway, 1942\u201345","volume":"20","author":"Mills","year":"2018"},{"year":"1993","series-title":"The Burma\u2013Thailand Railway: Memory and History","author":"McCormack","key":"b6"},{"key":"b7","series-title":"The Japanese Occupation of Malaya and Singapore, 1941\u201345: A Social and Economic History","first-page":"188","author":"Kratoska","year":"2018"},{"key":"b8","series-title":"Health History","first-page":"75","article-title":"More complex than a stereotype: Australian POW doctors and the Japanese in captivity, 1942\u201345","volume":"6","author":"Hearder","year":"2004"},{"key":"b9","series-title":"BMJ","first-page":"481","article-title":"Medical experiences in Japanese captivity","volume":"2","author":"Dunlop","year":"1946"},{"year":"1963","series-title":"The Burma\u2013Thailand Railway. 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Clinical Problems of War","author":"Walker","key":"b12"},{"key":"b13","series-title":"J R Army Med Corps","first-page":"189","article-title":"Transfusion of defibrinated blood in P.O.W. camps at Chungkai and Nakom Paton, Thailand","volume":"86","author":"Markowitz","year":"1946"},{"year":"1945","series-title":"Recipients and Donors for Blood for Transfusions","key":"b14"},{"year":"2022","series-title":"A Comparative Survival Analysis of Blood Donors and Recipients in a Prisoner of War Camp in Thailand Between August 1943 and September 1945","author":"Payne","key":"b15"},{"key":"b16","series-title":"The Thailand\u2013Burma Railway 1942\u20131946 Documents and Selected Writings.","first-page":"8342","author":"Kratoska","year":"2006"},{"key":"b17","series-title":"Am J Trop Med Hyg","first-page":"846","article-title":"Malaria-associated mortality in Australian and British prisoners of war on the Thai\u2013Burma Railway 1943\u20131944","volume":"100","author":"Shanks","year":"2019"},{"key":"b18","series-title":"Am J Trop Med Hyg","first-page":"544","article-title":"Malaria-associated mortality in the Australian Defence Force during the twentieth century","volume":"97","author":"Shanks","year":"2017"},{"year":"1983","series-title":"The Burma\u2013Siam Railway: The Secret Diary of Dr. Robert Hardie 1942\u201345","author":"Hardie","key":"b19"},{"year":"1942","author":"Sutherland","key":"b20"},{"key":"b21","series-title":"Trans R Soc Trop Med Hyg","first-page":"257","article-title":"Malaria among prisoners of war in Siam (\u201cF\u201d Force)","volume":"43","author":"Wilson","year":"1949"},{"key":"b22","series-title":"BMC Med","first-page":"217","article-title":"Mortality attributable to Plasmodium vivax malaria: A clinical audit from Papua, Indonesia","volume":"12","author":"Douglas","year":"2014"},{"key":"b23","series-title":"N Engl J Med","first-page":"420","article-title":"Transfusion volume for children with severe anemia in Africa","volume":"381","author":"Maitland","year":"2019"},{"key":"b24","series-title":"Am J Trop Med Hyg","first-page":"1093","article-title":"Pernicious Plasmodium vivax as a historical cause of malarial cachexia?","volume":"108","author":"Shanks","year":"2023"},{"year":"2005","series-title":"Surviving the Sword: Prisoners of the Japanese in the Far East, 1942\u20131945","author":"MacArthur","key":"b25"},{"key":"b26","series-title":"Lancet","first-page":"1056","article-title":"Malaria eradication within a generation: Ambitious, achievable, and necessary","volume":"394","author":"Feachem","year":"2019"}],"container-title":["The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene"],"original-title":[],"link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.ajtmh.org\/view\/journals\/tpmd\/112\/4\/article-p793.xml","content-type":"text\/html","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"text-mining"},{"URL":"https:\/\/www.ajtmh.org\/downloadpdf\/journals\/tpmd\/112\/4\/article-p793.xml","content-type":"text\/html","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"syndication"},{"URL":"https:\/\/www.ajtmh.org\/downloadpdf\/journals\/tpmd\/112\/4\/article-p793.xml","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,4,2]],"date-time":"2025-04-02T13:48:40Z","timestamp":1743601720000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.ajtmh.org\/view\/journals\/tpmd\/112\/4\/article-p793.xml"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2025,4,2]]},"references-count":26,"journal-issue":{"issue":"4"},"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4269\/ajtmh.24-0625","relation":{},"ISSN":["0002-9637","1476-1645"],"issn-type":[{"type":"print","value":"0002-9637"},{"type":"electronic","value":"1476-1645"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2025,4,2]]}}}