Blood Group Antigens, Malignancy and Infection
Program Code: 127-S
Saturday, October 15, 2005
2:00 PM to 3:30 PM (ET)

MODERATOR
George Garratty, PhD, FRCPath, American Red Cross Blood Services

SPEAKERS
George Garratty, PhD, FRCPath, American Red Cross Blood Services
Donald R. Branch, MT(ASCP)SBB, PhD, Canadian Blood Services

DESCRIPTION
Chemical moieties that we have called blood group antigens (BGA) because they are present on RBCs and have caused problems in transfusion therapy, are sometimes present on many other cells in the body. Some tumor antigens are identical to BGAs. There are close associations of BGAs with selectins, integrins, and cytokines, which directly relate to metastasis and angiogenesis. BGAs can act as receptors on RBCs and other cells for parasites, bacteria and viruses. These microbes can have chemicals resembling BGAs on their membranes which probably explains the presence of “naturally occurring” antibodies (e.g., anti-A, -B, Lewis, T, etc.) Infection (e.g., epidemics) may account for the worldwide differences in some blood groups.