A Study of Seroprevalence of Hepatitis Delta Virus (HDV) in Hepatitis B Virus Reactive Blood Donors at a Tertiary Care Hospital in Western Part of Rajasthan, India

Abstract

Introduction: Blood transfusion carries the risk of transmitting major infections such as Hepatitis, HIV, syphilis and malaria. HDV is a co-infection of HBV. Studies from various parts of India since 1990 shows variable prevalence rate of HDV. The present study was undertaken to evaluate the seroprevalence of HDV among HBV reactive blood donors.  Methodology: A blood bank based prospective study was conducted on blood donors found reactive for the HBsAg during routine screening for transfusion transmitted infections from January 2020 to December 2020. All the healthy blood donors were screened for anti-HIV 1 and 2, HBsAg and anti-HCV, Syphilis and malaria. Thus found HBsAg seropositive samples further screened for anti Hepatits D antibody. Results:Out of total 27450 blood donors 240 were found reactive for HBsAg. These 240 HBsAg reactive donors were further investigated for Anti Hepatitis D antibody. Out of them 2 cases were found positive for anti-Hepatitis D antibody showing prevalence of HDV among the Hepatitis B reactive blood donors as 0.83%.  Conclusion: The results of present study show that the seroprevalence of Hepatitis D among the HBsAg reactive blood donors is very low in western part of Rajasthan.