Neil Blumberg, MD, Steps Down as Director of URMC’s Transfusion Service

After more than 45 years of leadership in transfusion medicine, Neil Blumberg, MD, recently stepped down from his role as director of the transfusion medicine unit and blood bank at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC). He will continue to serve as director of URMC’s stem cell processing laboratory.

An expert in blood transfusion immunology, Blumberg joined the University of Rochester faculty in 1980 as the institution’s first full-time blood bank director and went on to become one of the field’s leading voices on transfusion immunomodulation and leukoreduction. He conducted his work in close collaboration with his longtime research partner and wife, Joanna Heal, MBBS, MRCP, whose contributions helped shape decades of influential studies in transfusion medicine. Across decades of research, publications and national service, Blumberg and Heal helped drive scientific debate around the immunologic consequences of blood transfusion and challenged longstanding assumptions about ABO compatibility, transfusion safety and clinical outcomes.

Blumberg and Heal’s work contributed to growing evidence supporting leukoreduction and ABO-identical transfusion strategies and helped shape modern thinking around patient blood management and evidence-based transfusion practice. Beyond his research contributions, Blumberg also played a significant role in the broader transfusion medicine community through leadership and advisory roles with national initiatives and organizations, including the NHLBI Recipient Epidemiology and Donor Evaluation Study (REDS) Program.

In addition to his research and clinical leadership, Blumberg made extensive contributions to AABB as an educator, author and committee member. He coauthored numerous AABB publications, served on AABB committees and working groups, and contributed to the scientific literature of transfusion medicine for more than four decades, including longtime service on the editorial board of Transfusion. In 2019, Blumberg was inducted into the AABB Foundation Hall of Fame in recognition of his decades of contributions to transfusion medicine.