The burden of transfusion related infections on thalassemia major Children

Aim: to determine the frequency of transfusion related infections in multi-transfused beta thalassemia major patients. methods: it was a descriptive cross-sectional study conducted indepartment of hematology and oncology,the children's hospital and institute of child health,lahore,from march 2014 to september 2014. a total 470 patients were included in the study between 1 to 15 years. an informed written consent from the parents was taken and information was recoded on a predesignedperforma. sera of the patients was sent to the hospital laboratory and tested forhepatitis b surface antigen (hbsag),anti-hepatitis c virus antibodies (hcv abs),anti hiv antibodies and cmv igm antibodies by using third generation enzyme linked immunosorbent (elisa) technique. results: among 470 patients diagnosed with beta thalassemia major,37 (7.87%)were positive for hepatitis b surface antigen,216 (45.96%) cases were positive for hepatitis c antibodies and 22 (4.68%) cases were positive for both hbsag and ant hcv abs. only 02 (0.42%) patients were positive for cmv igm antibodies and none was positive for anti hiv antibodies. there were 306 (65.1%) male and 164 (34.9%) female patients. predominately,206 (43.82 %) patients lied in age group of 1 to 5 years. the number of blood transfusions received in majority of cases (246,52.3%) was in the range of 1-50 times. conclusion: the frequency of transfusion related viruses especially hcv,isvery high among multitransfused beta thalassemia major children. this ignitesthe need of proper pre-transfusion screening of blood by third generation elisa for these viruses in the blood banks and transfusion centers.