Prevalence of seromarkers of HBV and HCV among blood donors in eastern Saudi Arabia, 1998-2001

Abstract

The prevalence of serological markers of HBV and HCV were determined for blood donors in eastern Saudi Arabia. Between 1998 and 2001, 13,443 donors (10,778 Saudi and 2665 non-Saudi), were screened for HBsAg, anti-HBc Ab, and anti-HCV Ab using commercial kits. There was a steady decrease in the HBsAg (2.58 and 1.67%), anti-HBc rates (15.32 and 9.15%), and anti-HCV (1.04 and 0.59%) rates between 1998 and 2001, respectively. However, there was a marked difference between Saudi and non-Saudi donors with regard to anti-HBc (P < 0.001) and anti-HCV (P < 0.01), but not HBsAg prevalence rates in the same time period.

Sero-Prevalence of HBs Ag, HCV and HIV among Blood Donors in Three Blood Bank Centers in Sana'a city: Yemen

“…This study presented that, the prevalence rate of HBs Ag was less than that has been previously reported in Sana'a City [13,14], In addition, the prevalence of HBs Ag in our study is quite similar to that reported by Acar et al [15], and Nazar et al [16] , whereas, slightly less than that reported by Al-Rubaye et al [17] , and Bashawri et al [18], who found that, (2.3%) and (2.58%) of blood donors have shown serological evidence for hepatitis B virus infection in Iraq and Saudi Arabia respectively.…”

Prevalence and predictors of hepatitis B in Jeddah City, Saudi Arabia: a population-based seroprevalence study

“…The seroprevalence reported in previous Saudi studies showed marked variations by region and study population. The seroprevalence of HBV was high in Madinah (9.02%) [8] and the eastern region of Saudi Arabia (6.7%) [9]. In the south-western region, Najran city, the seroprevalence was much higher (8.7%) among health-care workers, while it was as low as 1.7% among health students [10].…”

“…Usually, HBV infection occurs when an individual receives blood with HBsAg and anti-HBc (Hepatitis B core antibody) in the serum or plasma of donors [25,26]. In Saudi Arabia, the prevalence of HBsAg in blood donors was found to range from 2.7% to 9.8% [9,11,12]. Also, the prevalence of anti-HBc and HBsAg negative blood samples was 3.2% [27] and 13.5% [9] in Saudi blood donors.…”

“…The highest seroprevalence of HBV was found in Madinah (9.02%) [8], the eastern region (6.7%) and the south-western region (8.7%), whereas in Tabouk city in the north-western region the prevalence was 3.0%, and the central city of Riyadh recorded the lowest prevalence rate (1.5%) of all regions [9][10][11][12]. However, most of these surveys were restricted to certain sectors of the population, such as pregnant females, voluntary blood donors, health-care workers and students [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. Furthermore, these surveys did not clearly examine all risk factors suspected to be associated with the risk of this disease.…”

“…Thirty primary health-care centers were chosen randomly from a total of 48 centers serving Jeddah city and its suburban areas. The sample size was calculated according to the reported high prevalence of HBV infection (around 9%) reported in previous studies in Saudi Arabia [9][10][11], with an estimated precision of 1%, and confidence interval of 95%. The primary calculated sample size was 3,150 people.…”