Experience of individual donor nucleic acid testing on screening of blood donors for human immunodeficiency virus, hepatitis c virus, and hepatitis b virus at an Apex blood bank of Northern India

Abstract

Context: There is an ever-growing concern for the safety of blood transfusion with regard to the transmission of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis C (HCV) virus, and hepatitis B virus (HBV). About 11 million blood units are being collected in India every year. Instances of viral transmission through transfusion still occur as a result of donations that take place while a donor is in the pre-seroconversion window phase. Aim: The aim of the study is to analyze 4 years data of nucleic acid testing (NAT) for our blood donor population and validate the benefits of implementing individual donor NAT (ID-NAT). Subjects and Methods: A total of 54,895 blood donor samples were tested by ID-NAT method between January 2016 and December 2019. ID-NAT results and corresponding serological test results were collected and correlated for the identification of ID-NAT yield cases (seronegative/NAT positive) to identify the potential infected samples which may not be detected by the serological testing. Results: Of the 54,895 samples tested, there were total 71 samples which were serologically negative but detected by ID-NAT (ID-NAT yield). Among these 71 ID-NAT Yields, 3 were HIV, 12 were HCV, 46 were HBV, and 10 cases were reactive for HBV-HCV co-infections. Our combined ID-NAT yield rate was estimated to be 1 in 773 donations tested. Conclusion: Higher incidence of NAT only reactive donors poses a risk of transfusion transmissible infections in blood centers not adopting NAT. HBV NAT displays the highest yield, thereby recommending the universal adoption of NAT for all three viral markers, namely HIV, HBV, and HCV in our country.

Keywords

• hepatitis b virus
• hepatitis c virus
• human immunodeficiency virus
• individual donor-nucleic acid testing
• serological