Prof. Simon J. Stanworth Honored with 2026 Tibor Greenwalt Memorial Award

This year’s recipient of the Tibor Greenwalt Memorial Award has been an important contributor to the blood and biotherapies field throughout his career. Simon J. Stanworth, MA, FRCP (Paeds, UK), D.Phil, FRCPath, professor of hematology and transfusion medicine, Radcliffe Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, was announced as the 2026 recipient earlier this year in recognition of his exemplary contributions to transfusion medicine and advancements in patient outcomes worldwide. AABB looks forward to bestowing the award to Dr. Stanworth and celebrating his career in person at the upcoming AABB Annual Meeting in Atlanta.

The Tibor Greenwalt Memorial Award was created to honor Tibor Greenwalt, MD, who was the first registrant at the first AABB Annual Meeting and founding editor of Transfusion. The award recognizes an individual who made major scientific or clinical contributions to hematology, transfusion medicine or biotherapies, and succinctly communicated these advances.¹

“I am honored,” Stanworth told AABB News. “It is very heartening to be recognized not only for the work I have been doing, but also for the partnerships and collaborations with many teams and individuals internationally, including at AABB.”

To Transfuse Or Not to Transfuse?

Stanworth trained in pediatrics after medical school, and he always looked for opportunities for research in children and infants. A trained hematologist, Stanworth began to specialize in transfusion medicine during the later stages of his medical training. His interest in transfusion medicine was sparked by its influence across many different medical disciplines, and the strong foundation it has in the laboratory.

Throughout his career, much of his research has been centered on determining which patients really require transfusion and how best to determine if the patient will benefit from transfusion.

“Patients ask, ‘Doctor, how much good will this transfusion do me?’ or ‘Do I really need this transfusion?’,” Stanworth said. “I would say that one of my main achievements has been completing a series of practice-changing randomized trials to help answer those questions.”

For example, in 2013, Stanworth and colleagues published the results of a trial (TOPPS) designed to assess whether giving prophylactic platelet transfusions to prevent bleeding in patients with hematologic cancers was necessary, or if transfusions could be delayed until the onset of a bleeding event. One key message from the trial was that many patients continued to experience bleeding events despite a policy of prophylaxis, suggesting that factors other than those addressed by platelet transfusion are responsible for bleeding.²

In 2019, Stanworth and colleagues published the results of the PlaNeT2 / MATISSE trial, a multicenter trial that included 660 infants born at less than 34 weeks gestation who developed severe thrombocytopenia. The infants were randomly assigned to receive a platelet transfusion at a threshold of 50,000 per cubic millimeter (high-threshold) or 25,000 per cubic millimeter (low-threshold). Death or new major bleeding occurred in 26% of infants assigned the high-threshold compared with 19% of infants assigned the low threshold (odds ratio=1.57; 95% CI, 1.06-2.32; P=.02).³

“The results indicated that babies who received more platelet transfusion did worse,” Stanworth said. “The liberal strategy wasn’t just providing no added benefit but was actually causing harm.”

Stanworth has led and supported national randomized trials in major bleeding. He was a co-lead investigator on an international open-label, randomized controlled trial of early empiric high-dose cryoprecipitate for major trauma hemorrhage (CRYOSTAT-2). Early, empiric, administration of high-dose cryoprecipitate did not improve 28-day mortality in an unselected cohort of 1,604 patients with severe traumatic hemorrhage.⁴

Recently, Stanworth was part of a team of researchers that evaluated the use of prehospital whole-blood transfusion in the management of severe hemorrhage, a practice that has gained traction in recent years. Conducted in England, the study evaluated outcomes in patients with major traumatic hemorrhage randomly assigned to receive up to two units whole-blood or standard care with blood components before arrival at the hospital. Results indicated that prehospital transfusion was not superior to standard care for reduction in risk of mortality or massive transfusion within 24 hours.⁵

Altogether, Stanworth has published more than 600 scientific papers covering many different areas of research and quality improvement.

More Work Needed

During his lecture, Stanworth plans to discuss the questions of how transfusion might benefit patients, and briefly mention alternatives to transfusion, and why the practice of transfusion is so variable.

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“I want to discuss some of the research into use of plasma, platelet and red cell transfusions, which I have been involved with throughout the past 15 years, and lessons learnt,” Stanworth said.

Stanworth has an additional interest in trying to ensure that research is used to change practice. He has devoted time to working in collaboration with AABB and other organizations to develop robust guidelines for areas such as red cell transfusion, red cell transfusion in acute myocardial infarction and platelet transfusion, with more in development.^6,7,8

Ultimately, he hopes his talk will remind attendees to understand the key message of moving away from looking at just a number or specific result of a blood test (e.g., hemoglobin or platelet count), but to really look at the patient in front of them.

“The benefits and risks of transfusion need careful consideration for each patient,” Stanworth said.

Even with his wide variety of professional accomplishments in the field of transfusion, Stanworth said he is still troubled by the fact that when a patient asks, he does not always have a clear answer to the question, “What good will this transfusion do me?”

“This uncertainty should remain a continued major priority for transfusion medicine globally,” Stanworth said. “Put another way, in many cases, the safest transfusion is the one not given because it wasn’t warranted.”

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References

1. AABB. Tibor Greenwalt Memorial Award and Lectureship. https://www.aabb.org/membership/get-involved/awards/aabb-memorial-awards/tibor-greenwalt-memorial-award-and-lectureship. Accessed September 3, 2026.
2. Stanworth SJ, Estcourt LJ, Powter G, et al. A No-Prophylaxis Platelet-Transfusion Strategy for Hematologic Cancers. N Engl J Med. 2013;368:1771-1780.
3. Curley A, Stanworth SJ, Willoughby K, et al. Randomized Trial of Platelet-Transfusion Thresholds in Neonates. N Engl J Med. 2019;380:242-251.
4. Davenport R, Curry N, Fox EE, et al. Early and Empirical High-Dose Cryoprecipitate for Hemorrhage After Traumatic Injury: The CRYOSTAT-2 Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA. 2023;330(19):1882-1891.
5. Smith JE, Cardigan R, Sanderson E, et al. Prehospital Whole Blood in Traumatic Hemorrhage — A Randomized Controlled Trial. N Engl J Med. 2026;394:2305-2316.
6. Carson JL, Stanworth SJ, Guyatt G, et al. Red Blood Cell Transfusion. 2023 AABB International Guidelines. JAMA. 2023;330;(19):1892-1902.
7. Pagano MC, Stanworth SJ, Dennis J, et al. Red Cell Transfusion in Acute Myocardial Infarction: AABB International Clinical Practice Guidelines. Ann Intern Med. 2025;178(10):1469-1477.
8. Metcalf RA, Nahirniak S, Guyatt G, et al. Platelet Transfusion. 2025 AABB and ICTMG International Clinical Practice Guidelines. JAMA. 2025;334;(7):606-617.