LAUSR

Dear Editor, We thank the authors for their interest in our paper. However, if the authors had analyzed our patients and methods section they should have seen that we deliberately did not used hemoglobin levels to evaluate possible blood loss. We used hemoglobin levels preoperatively and postoperatively (at 48 h) only for patient safety and for no other reason. All of our anemic patients were transfused when necessary during the postoperative period, as mentioned in the patients and methods section; thus, it would be abnormal if transfused patients had different results at 48 h. We did not use hemoglobin levels for the evaluation of blood loss, as it is well known that hemoglobin levels are prone to errors and variability depending on factors such as patient physiology, sample source (arterial, venous or capillary), body position (standing, sitting, supine), time of sample collection (diurnal variations), usage of tourniquet Dear Editor,