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      Transfusion-transmitted infections

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          Abstract

          Although the risk of transfusion-transmitted infections today is lower than ever, the supply of safe blood products remains subject to contamination with known and yet to be identified human pathogens. Only continuous improvement and implementation of donor selection, sensitive screening tests and effective inactivation procedures can ensure the elimination, or at least reduction, of the risk of acquiring transfusion transmitted infections. In addition, ongoing education and up-to-date information regarding infectious agents that are potentially transmitted via blood components is necessary to promote the reporting of adverse events, an important component of transfusion transmitted disease surveillance. Thus, the collaboration of all parties involved in transfusion medicine, including national haemovigilance systems, is crucial for protecting a secure blood product supply from known and emerging blood-borne pathogens.

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          Most cited references146

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          A novel DNA virus (TTV) associated with elevated transaminase levels in posttransfusion hepatitis of unknown etiology.

          By means of representational difference analysis, a viral clone (N22) of 500 nucleotides was isolated from serum of a patient (TT) with posttransfusion hepatitis of unknown etiology. The N22 clone showed a poor homology to any reported sequences. Oligonucleotide primers were deduced from the N22 sequence for detecting it by polymerase chain reaction. N22 sequence in serum banded at a sucrose density of 1.26 g/cm3, indicating its association with a viral particle which was designated TT virus (TTV). Since nucleic acids of TTV were sensitive to DNase I, it would be a DNA virus. TTV DNA was detected in sera from three of the five patients with posttransfusion non-A to G hepatitis, including the index case (TT). TTV DNA titers closely correlated with aminotransferase levels in the three patients. These results indicate that TTV would be a novel DNA virus with a possible capacity to induce posttransfusion non-A to G hepatitis. Copyright 1997 Academic Press.
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            Transmission of West Nile virus through blood transfusion in the United States in 2002.

            During the 2002 West Nile virus epidemic in the United States, patients were identified whose West Nile virus illness was temporally associated with the receipt of transfused blood and blood components. Patients with laboratory evidence of recent West Nile virus infection within four weeks after receipt of a blood component from a donor with viremia were considered to have a confirmed transfusion-related infection. We interviewed the donors of these components, asking them whether they had had symptoms compatible with the presence of a viral illness before or after their donation; blood specimens retained from the time of donation and collected at follow-up were tested for West Nile virus. Twenty-three patients were confirmed to have acquired West Nile virus through transfused leukoreduced and nonleukoreduced red cells, platelets, or fresh-frozen plasma. Of the 23 recipients, 10 (43 percent) were immunocompromised owing to transplantation or cancer and 8 (35 percent) were at least 70 years of age. Immunocompromised recipients tended to have longer incubation periods than nonimmunocompromised recipients and infected persons in mosquito-borne community outbreaks. Sixteen donors with evidence of viremia at donation were linked to the 23 infected recipients; of these donors, 9 reported viral symptoms before or after donation, 5 were asymptomatic, and 2 were lost to follow-up. Fever, new rash, and painful eyes were independently associated with being an implicated donor with viremia rather than a donor without viremia. All 16 donors were negative for West Nile virus-specific IgM antibody at donation. Transfused red cells, platelets, and fresh-frozen plasma can transmit West Nile virus. Screening of potential donors with the use of nucleic acid-based assays for West Nile virus may reduce this risk. Copyright 2003 Massachusetts Medical Society
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              Detection of HIV-1 and HCV infections among antibody-negative blood donors by nucleic acid-amplification testing.

              Testing of blood donors for human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA by means of nucleic acid amplification was introduced in the United States as an investigational screening test in mid-1999 to identify donations made during the window period before seroconversion. We analyzed all antibody-nonreactive donations that were confirmed to be positive for HIV-1 and HCV RNA on nucleic acid-amplification testing of "minipools" (pools of 16 to 24 donations) by the main blood-collection programs in the United States during the first three years of nucleic acid screening. Among 37,164,054 units screened, 12 were confirmed to be positive for HIV-1 RNA--or 1 in 3.1 million donations--only 2 of which were detected by HIV-1 p24 antigen testing. For HCV, of 39,721,404 units screened, 170 were confirmed to be positive for HCV RNA, or 1 in 230,000 donations (or 1 in 270,000 on the basis of 139 donations confirmed to be positive for HCV RNA with the use of a more sensitive HCV-antibody test). The respective rates of positive HCV and HIV-1 nucleic acid-amplification tests were 3.3 and 4.1 times as high among first-time donors as among donors who gave blood repeatedly. Follow-up studies of 67 HCV RNA-positive donors demonstrated that seroconversion occurred a median of 35 days after the index donation, followed by a low rate of resolution of viremia; three cases of long-term immunologically silent HCV infection were documented. Minipool nucleic acid-amplification testing has helped prevent the transmission of approximately 5 HIV-1 infections and 56 HCV infections annually and has reduced the residual risk of transfusion-transmitted HIV-1 and HCV to approximately 1 in 2 million blood units. Copyright 2004 Massachusetts Medical Society
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                Author and article information

                Journal
                J Transl Med
                Journal of Translational Medicine
                BioMed Central (London )
                1479-5876
                2007
                6 June 2007
                : 5
                : 25
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Partners AIDS Research Center, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
                [2 ]Swiss Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service of Southern Switzerland, Lugano, Switzerland
                [3 ]NIH Clinical Center, HLA Typing Laboratory, Bethesda, MD, USA
                [4 ]American Red Cross, Holland Laboratory, Rockville, MD, USA
                Article
                1479-5876-5-25
                10.1186/1479-5876-5-25
                1904179
                17553144
                e1ec4bd0-e893-43f8-a617-a526395985e5
                Copyright © 2007 Bihl et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

                This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

                History
                : 18 May 2007
                : 6 June 2007
                Categories
                Review

                Medicine
                Medicine

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