Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection among Health Care Workers Who Donate Blood

Abstract

Blood donors can serve as a sentinel cohort when evaluating the risk for occupationally acquired HIV infection. These findings suggest that among the many health care worker donors in this study, HIV infection attributable to occupational exposure was uncommon.

Prevalence of transfusion‐transmissible viral infections in first‐time US blood donors by donation site

“…The rate among health‐care workers who donated blood was also reported to be very low 21 . The prevalence of HIV observed in our study was consistent with previous findings in blood donors 21 and the odds of being HIV+ at health‐care sites was comparable to that of all other donation sites except for military, education, and religious sites.…”

“…These associations persisted after adjustment for age, sex, and new-donor status and test results of anti-HBc. While a number of studies conducted in the US have estimated seroprevalence of major viral markers in military and health-care personnel, [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] only one has focused on blood donors. 21 Chamberland and coworkers 21 estimated an HIV prevalence of 0.04 percent in 8519 health-care workers who donated blood between March 1990 and August 1991.…”

Risk factors for HCV infection among blood donors confirmed to be positive for the presence of HCV RNA and not reactive for the presence of anti‐HCV

“…Most donors who are anti‐HCV–, but confirmed positive for circulating HCV RNA at the time of their donation, likely acquired their infection recently. In contrast to anti‐HCV+ donors in cross‐sectional studies in which the temporal sequence of the exposure relative to the onset of infection is unknown, this group of donors may provide a good opportunity to assess potential exposures at a time close to infection and may provide insight into cryptic infection routes 6 …”

Evaluation of the Safety of Rh Immunoglobulin by Monitoring Viral Markers among Rh–Negative Female Blood Donors

“…A similar application of this approach was conducted by Chamberland et al [21]to show that blood donors who worked in health care settings were not at increased risk of HIV infection. Since rates of viral infection from blood products have declined to very low levels, it is no longer feasible to perform prospective studies to directly measure risk [22].…”