title: A comparison of different methods of screening blood donations for HBsAg.
abstract: In a retrospective comparison between countermigration immunoelectrophoresis (CIEP) and reverse passive haemagglutination (RPHA) for screening 260,500 blood donations, the latter's 10-fold increase in sensitivity resulted in 36% more HBsAg detections. In a prospective comparison between RPHA and radioimmunoassay (RIA) the latter's 40-fold increase in sensitivity over RPHA resulted in 11% more detections than RPHA in 27,094 new donors. One in 500 new donors was HBsAg-positive by RPHA, compared with 1 in 11,000 established donors who had donated and been tested previously. Acute hepatitis B infections, though uncommon, accounted for a greater proportion of the HBsAg-positive found in "established" rather than new donors. Reported post-transfusion hepatitis cases have declined following the introduction of screening tests in 1971. The feasibility of RIA testing at a transfusion centre supplied simply with the two basic RIA reagents has been demonstrated.
mesh_terms: D001782:Blood Donors; D003378:Counterimmunoelectrophoresis; D005189:False Positive Reactions; D006386:Hemagglutination Tests; D006505:Hepatitis / Q000209:etiology; D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens / Q000032:analysis*; D006801:Humans; D007565:Jaundice / Q000276:immunology; D011863:Radioimmunoassay; D065227:Transfusion Reaction
chemical_list: D006514:Hepatitis B Surface Antigens