Seroprevalence of Syphilis and Hepatitis C Virus Coinfection among Blood Donors Attending Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano-Nigeria

Abstract

Blood transfusion is an important component of patients management, as it saves millions of life each year, but it also serves as a vehicle for transmission of blood-pathogens such as hepatitis C virus and syphilis as a result World Health Organization has recommended that all blood samples should be screened for transfusion transmissible infections prior to transfusion. Therefore this was conducted to determine the seroprevalence and socio-demographic distribution of Hepatitis C virus and Syphilis among blood donors in Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano. This is a cross sectional study of blood donors presented at the donor clinic of Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano between July and September 2018. A total of 90 blood samples were collected from voluntary and family replacement donors, aged between 18-57 years, the collected samples were screened for anti-Treponema pallidum antibodies using a rapid diagnostic kits and were also screened for the presence of anti-HCV and anti-Treponema pallidum antibodies using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kit. All of the total 90 (100%) donors screened were males. Family replacement and voluntary donors were of 76 (84.4%) and 14(15.6%) donors respectively. The overall seroprevalence of HCV and syphilis was 7.8% (5.6% and 2.2% for HCV and syphilis respectively using ELISA test). Prevalence of 1.3% was found for syphilis using a rapid diagnostic kit. Therefore critical screening of blood donors is of prime importance because they serve as an asymptomatic reservoir and a potential source of transmission of these infections.