Hébert et al. [73] sought to examine further whether a restrictive transfusion strategy was at least as effective as a liberal strategy in critically ill patients with cardiac disease. In the subgroup of patients with cardiovascular disease from the TRICC trial, those investigators suggested that most haemodynamically stable critically ill patients with cardiovascular disease may be transfused when haemoglobin concentrations fall below 70 g/l, and that the hemoglobin concentration should be maintained between 70 and 90 g/l. Average daily haemoglobin concentrations were 85 ± 6.2 g/l in the restrictive transfusion group and 103 ± 6.7 g/l in the liberal transfusion group (P < 0.01). In the 357 patients with cardiovascular disease, the 30-day mortality rate was 23% in the restrictive transfusion group versus 23% in the liberal group (95% confidence interval of the difference -8.4% to 9.1%; P = 1.00). Other mortality rates, including 60-day (26% versus 27%; P = 0.90), ICU (19% versus 16%; P = 0.49) and hospital mortality (27% versus 28%; P = 0.81), were not significantly different between groups. Kaplan-Meier survival curves comparing time to death demonstrated similar trends in the two groups ( Fig. 3 ; P = 0.98). The multiple organ dysfunction (MOD) scores, during the entire study period, were also not significantly different between groups (8.6 ± 4.9 versus 9.0 ± 4.4; P = 0.40), but the change in MOD score from baseline values was significantly lower in the restrictive group than in the liberal group (0.2 ± 4.2 versus 1.3 ± 4.4; P = 0.02).