The impact of ABO blood group on the prevalence of transfusion-transmitted infections among blood donors in a tertiary-care hospital

Abstract

Objectives: Transfusion-transmitted infections are a serious complication of blood transfusion. Devising a means of detecting at-risk blood donors may be beneficial in low- and middle-income countries such as Nigeria. We sought to determine the impact of ABO blood group on the prevalence of transfusion transmitted infections.

Methods: A retrospective observational study was carried out at the blood bank of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University Teaching Hospital in Nigeria using data from blood donors. Information retrieved about donors included sex; blood group; and results of HIV, hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg), hepatitis C virus (HCV), and Venereal Disease Research Laboratory screening results. Microsoft Excel was used to sort the data and, the data analysis was conducted using R, version 4.3.2 (R Foundation for Statistical Computing). P < .05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: A total of 2356 donor records were reviewed; the majority of these donors were male. The prevalence of HIV, HBsAg, HCV, and venereal diseases in the study population was 0.5%, 3.3%, 1.6%, and 0.6%, respectively. There was a possible increased risk of HCV among blood group B donors (P < .02799).

Conclusions: Blood group B donors were found to have a higher risk of contracting HCV infection than other donors. This finding could give more insights on donor selection and screening. Further studies that are more broadly based are required to validate our findings.

Keywords: ABO blood group; blood donors; blood transfusion; tertiary institution; transfusion transmitted infections.