INTRODUCTIONIn transfusion medicine, Rh system is a complex blood group system having 49 different antigens. Out of all these, D antigen is the most significant. D antigen has more than 30 distinct epitopes, more than 100 known haplotypes with similar phenotypes of different alleles [1,2]
AIMThe current study was designed to determine the frequency of weak D antigen in patients coming to this tertiary hospital so that recommendations can be formulated for considering weak D serology as a routine procedure to avoid transfusion related complications and misdiagnosis.
MATERIALS AND METHODSThis two years hospital based cross-sectional study was carried out at licensed blood storage centre under Department of Pathology from January, 2012 to December, 2014 in a 350 bedded neurosciences Institute catering to patients from Delhi, Ghaziabad, Bulandshahar, Baghpat, Muradnagar, Moradabad and Meerut districts of Uttar Pradesh and Karnal, Jind, Jhajjar and Sonipat districts of Haryana. This blood storage centre is attached to Regional blood transfusion centre, Guru Teg Bahadur (GTB) Hospital (mother blood bank) to meet its demand of whole blood and blood components. The sample study included patients, both admitted as well as attending outpatient departments, and donors. Informed consents of all the subjects were taken. Two ml blood samples were collected in EDTA vacutainers and tested for ABO forward and reverse grouping by conventional slide, tube and gel card methods. Rh-D forward typing was done using commercially available monoclonal anti D sera having blend of
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.