[ad. L. transfūsiōn-em, n. of action from transfundĕre to TRANSFUSE. Cf. F. transfusion (1307 in Godef., Compl.).] The action of transfusing.
1. The action of pouring a liquid from one vessel into another; also fig. transference; transmission; translation.
1578. Banister, Hist. Man, I. 14. Nerves … pass through them [bones] … for the transfusion of sense into other partes.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett. (1650), II. II. xlviii. 61. It is with languages as ’tis with liquors which by transfusion use to take wind from one vessell to another.
1700. Dryden, Fables, Pref. (1721), 24. I grant that something must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all translations.
c. 1780. Burney, in Boswell, Johnson (1848), 71/2, note. He would find the transfusion into another language extremely difficult.
1835. Fraser’s Mag., XII. 394. Of all poets, Theocritus is perhaps the least susceptible of transfusion.
1850. Grote, Greece, II. lxviii. VIII. 595. Such persuasion had grown up gradually…, partly by insensible transfusion from others.
2. Med., etc. The process of transferring the blood of a person or animal into the veins of another; the injection of blood or other fluid into the veins.
1643. Plain English, 21. As if they … should, of a sudden, receive a Transfusion of Sheeps Blood from the others.
1678. Phillips, s.v., Transfusion of the blood is a late Anatomical invention experimented by the Royal Society.
1802. Paley, Nat. Theol., xxv. (ed. 2), 484. The experiment of transfusion proves, that the blood of one animal will serve for another.
1877. Roberts, Handbk. Med. (ed. 3), I. 41. In some cases transfusion of blood is demanded, in order to save life and to replace the blood which has been lost.
3. attrib. and Comb., as transfusion apparatus, plan; transfusion cell (Bot.), one of certain cells that remain thin-walled and thus permit the passage of water to the adjacent tissues; so transfusion strand, tissue.
1832. J. Brown, Lett. (1907), 25. Give me the latest information about the transfusion plan, specifying the quantities of salt [etc.].
1875. Bennett & Dyer, trans. Sachs’ Bot., 466. Cells elongated in a direction transverse to the axis of the leaf … leaving large intercellular spaces (Transfusion-Tissue of Mohl).
1877. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2613/2. Aveling’s Transfusion-Apparatus.
1898. trans. Strasburger’s Text-bk. Bot., I. i. 112. Special endodermal cells, directly external to the xylem strands, remain unthickened and serve as transfusion cells. Ibid., 111. Transfusion strands.
Hence Transfusionist, one who advocates or practises the process of transfusion of blood.
1889. Pop. Sci. Monthly, April, 808. The early transfusionists reasoned, in the style of the Christian Scientists, that the blood is the life.
