October 04, 2021
Dennis Goldfinger, MD, a transfusion medicine specialist and educator for more than 50 years, died Sept. 15. A passionate advocate for transfusion medicine education, Goldfinger was personally involved in the training of more than 40 transfusion medicine physicians, first at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles and then at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. Goldfinger was also on the vanguard of transfusion medicine, establishing one of the first autologous donation programs during the early HIV epidemic and pioneering the adoption of routine washing of red blood cells that formed the foundation for leukoreduction.
Goldfinger received several awards for his contributions to transfusion medicine and transfusion medicine education. He was the 2017 recipient of AABB’s Emily Cooley Memorial Award and Lectureship, a recipient of the American Society for Apheresis Francis S. Morrison Memorial Lecture Award, and a recipient of the California Blood Bank Society (CBBS)’s Suzanne Ledin Memorial Lectureship. Upon his retirement, Goldfinger established the Dennis Goldfinger Memorial Lectureship, awarded by CBBS, which recognizes a transfusion medicine physician who consistently demonstrated dedication to clinical practice of transfusion medicine and a commitment to training of future transfusion medicine physicians.