Prevalence of D u Phenotype amongst Rhesus Negative Females in Port Harcourt, Nigeria

Abstract

The prevalence of D u phenotype was investigated among rhesus negative women of childbearing age (15-45 years) in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, over a period of 17 months. A total of 1,108 women were randomly sampled, out of which 1,003 (90.5%) were rhesus positive and 105 (9.5%) rhesus negative. Only one (0.95%) of the Rh-negative women was D u positive while 104 (99.05%) were D u negative (true rhesus negatives). The results show that the incidence of D u phenotype in Nigeria may not be uniform -it is high among the Yorubas (7.5%) and rare among the Ijaws and Efik-Ibibios of the south-east. The results also suggest that D u testing may not be indicated in all individuals initially typed as rhesus negative while being strongly indicated only in areas of high prevalence. More studies are required in other parts of Nigeria to provide data that may facilitate the adoption of a comprehensive nationwide policy on appropriate management of rhesus negative women in the country. This will include the D u testing of all rhesus negative mothers in areas of high D u phenotype prevalence before the prophylactic administration of anti-human immunoglobulin (Rhogam

Detection of Weak D (Du) Phenotype among Rh-D Negative Males and Females in Kumasi, Ghana

“…The finding of 7.75% prevalence of Rh-negative among donors in this study (Fig 1A) is in keeping with available records of low prevalence of Rh-negative in other African countries. Among Kenyans 3.9% has been reported and 1-6% among Nigerians (Nwauche et al, 2003). The low incidence of Rh-negativity contrasts markedly with high figures obtained elsewhere, for example, about 15% -17% among Europeans (Race and Sanger, 1975) and 15% in the USA population (Mollison et al, 1997).…”

“…The frequency of the weak D phenotype in whites is approximately 0.2% to 1% (Flegel et al, 2000;Wagner et al, 2000), up to 10% in Africans (Cheesbrough, 2000), 7.5% among the Yoruba of South-Western Nigeria, 0.75% in Kenya (Lyko et al, 1992), 0.6% in the United Kingdom (Nwauche et al, 2003) and approximately 0.23% in USA (Mollison et al, 1997). Nwauche et al, (2003) found 0.95% among adult females in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. These varied results from Nigeria depicted heterogeneity in the prevalence of weak D, even among somewhat homogenous entities.…”

Study on weak D antigen (Du ) at a Tertiary Healthcare Center in Blood Donors of Tripura

“…Among Nigerians 1-6% has been reported and 3.9% among Kenyans (6) . High figures obtained elsewhere, for example, about 15% -17% among Europeans ( 7.)…”

Detection of Weak Rh D (DU) Phenotype among Blood Donors

“…[5] Whereas in a study conducted by Dr. Geeta et all the prevalence was slightly on the higher side (0.49%) On the contrary high prevalence of weak D individuals is seen in Africans (10%). [6,7] Among Indians 0.09%-0.189% prevalence has been reported8. According to American Association of Blood Banks (AABB) it is mandatory to detect the weak D/partial D status of the donor but the recipient can be safely considered as RhD negative.…”

“…Weak D is weakly immunogenic and requires detection by antihuman globulin. [6] Partial D antigen lack one or more epitopes on red blood cells8. Thus RBCs having partial D antigen are agglutinated distinctively by some but not all monoclonal anti D reagents.…”