Prevalence of Hepatitis B in Family or Occasional Blood Donors in Lwiro Pediatric Hospital, East of DRC

Background: Blood transfusion is an operation that consists of injecting blood or its derivatives into an individual by intravenous infusion. According to the WHO, blood transfusion is a substitute treatment indicated to partially and temporarily compensate for the deficit of one or more blood tissue components that would jeopardize the survival of the patient. Material & Methods: This is a prospective study on the seroprevalence of hepatitis B in voluntary and family blood donors. The study took place over a period of one year, from January 1, 2021 to December 31, 2021.Our target population was made up of all voluntary and family blood donors who came to donate to patients who had consulted the Lwiro Pediatric Hospital and presented with anemia. Made up of 647 patients including 216 donors, our sampling is exhaustive. The study included all blood donors (volunteers, family) who were listed in the laboratory registers of the said hospital during the study period. Serodiagnosis on each donation was carried out using the following reagents: Determine™ HBs Ag Abbott for HBV and HCVSCAN for hepatitis C as well as RPR. We collected data from pre-established data collection sheets, monthly blood transfusion registers. The data collected were encoded, entered, processed and analyzed using the R software. Results: Anemic patients were more numerous (33.38%) and the relative risk is 0.5. Male blood donors were more numerous (57.41%) than females (42.59%) and 14% of cases were HBSAg positive cases, of which 7.26% of men against 5% were HBSAg positive. 16.66% of cases occurred in November, 13.42% in October, 11.11% in December and 10.18% in January.Conclusion: Hepatitis B is a real public health problem that is rampant in our environment and increases the risk of transmission of the disease and is possible if transfusion safety is not taken into account. Out of a total of 647 patients admitted to hospital, 216 of them presented with decompensated anemia requiring blood transfusion, i.e. 33.38%. Of the 216 family donors, 6.48% tested positive for HBSAg, which is not negligible. From this study, it is necessary to recommend to health authorities to provide hospitals with AgHBS tests. Hospitals to set up a club of voluntary blood donors that they can control and have a blood bank.