Who do we gain? Enhancement of blood supplies by additional testing for donors who travel.

AIMS/OBJECTIVES: To describe the impact of additional testing on the England blood supply.

BACKGROUND

The blood service for England, NHS Blood and Transplant, applies a system of deferral and testing to donors with potential exposure to Chagas disease, malaria and West Nile virus; however, testing costs must be justified. Here, we describe the donations and donors gained by testing.

METHODS

Donation testing results and demographic data on donors in England where additional testing was applied were analysed in 2012-2016. The total number and proportion of donations tested, reactive and confirmed positive were calculated. Proportions of donors requiring additional tests were calculated by ethnic group for first-time and repeat donors.

RESULTS

Additional testing for travel was applied to 3·5% of NHSBT blood donations between 2012 and 2016. Over 98% of these tests were non-reactive. Only malaria tests were confirmed positive, in 1·7% of donations tested. In first-time donors, 45 and 40% of Asian and Black donors required an additional test, respectively, mainly for malaria. Testing for West Nile virus increased from 1·5% in 2012 to 2·2% of donations in 2016.

CONCLUSION

The majority of additional tests were screened negative, allowing approximately 64 000 donations to be released for issue annually. Donors most affected by malaria testing were more likely to have rare blood groups and be targeted for recruitment, whereas those given West Nile virus testing were mainly regular donors required for continuity of supply. These data show differences in the characteristics of donors by test and can be used to inform decisions about additional testing and deferrals.