Catherine A. Hyland

Dengue viremia in blood donors from Honduras, Brazil, and Australia.

BACKGROUND: Dengue fever and hemorrhagic disease are caused by four dengue virus (DENV) serotypes (DENV‐1 to ‐4), mosquito‐borne flaviviruses with increasing incidence, and expanding global distributions. Documented transfusion transmission of West Nile virus raised concern regarding transfusion‐transmitted DENV.

Sensitivity of HCV RNA and HIV RNA blood screening assays

BACKGROUND: The FDA requirement for sensitivity of viral NAT methods used in blood screening is a 95‐percent detection limit of 100 copies per mL, whereas the NAT screening system should have a sensitivity of at least 5000 copies per mL per individual donation. According to the Common Technical Specifications of the European Directive 98/79/EC for in vitro diagnostics, viral standard dilutions (calibrated against the WHO standard) should be tested at least 24 times for a statistically valid assessment of the 95‐percent detection limit.

The risk of dengue transmission by blood during a 2004 outbreak in Cairns, Australia

BACKGROUND: Dengue virus (DENV) is a Flavivirus transmitted by the Aedes mosquito. The related arbovirus, West Nile virus, has been shown to be transfusion transmitted, which, added to the four recorded dengue transfusion‐associated cases, indicates that DENV is also transfusion transmitted. The purpose of this study was to assess the risk of transfusion‐transmitted DENV during a 2004 outbreak in the Australian city of Cairns.

Implications of Dengue Outbreaks for Blood Supply, Australia

Dengue outbreaks have increased in size and frequency in Australia, and transfusion-transmitted dengue poses a risk to transfusion safety. Using whole blood samples collected during the large 2008–2009 dengue epidemic, we estimated the risk for a dengue-infectious blood donation as ≈1 in 7,146 (range 2,218–50,021).

Anti‐D in pregnant women with the RHD(IVS3+1G>A)‐associated DEL phenotype

BACKGROUND: Pregnant women with the DEL phenotype appear to be D– by routine serology. Women with DEL phenotypes that show a partial D‐like epitope loss may develop anti‐D. It has been proposed that this alloantibody could have a deleterious effect with respect to hemolytic disease in the fetus and newborn.

Follow-up of six blood donors highlights the complementary role and limitations of hepatitis C virus antibody and nucleic acid amplification tests.

Background and Objectives The purpose of this study was to analyse the follow‐up results for six blood donors who screened positive for hepatitis C virus (HCV) by nucleic acid amplification technology (NAT) but were non‐reactive in the primary antibody immunoassay (HCV NAT yield).

Evaluation of targeted exome sequencing for 28 protein‐based blood group systems, including the homologous gene systems, for blood group genotyping

Blood group single nucleotide polymorphism genotyping probes for a limited range of polymorphisms. This study investigated whether massively parallel sequencing (also known as next‐generation sequencing), with a targeted exome strategy, provides an extended blood group genotype and the extent to which massively parallel sequencing correctly genotypes in homologous gene systems, such as RH and MNS.

The RHD(1227G>A) DEL‐associated allele is the most prevalent DEL allele in Australian D– blood donors with C+ and/or E+ phenotypes

Red blood cells (RBCs) with D antigen levels only detected by anti‐D adsorption‐elution and an antiglobulin test express a DEL phenotype. For two DEL types, including RHD(1227G>A), immunization of D– recipients has been reported. This studys aim was to measure the prevalence of DEL‐associated RHD alleles in a cohort of Australian D– donors to develop a model to estimate alloimmunization risk.

Noninvasive fetal RHD genotyping by microfluidics digital PCR using maternal plasma from two alloimmunized women with the variant RHD(IVS3+1G>A) allele

Whats already known about this topic? Noninvasive prenatal RHD typing can be achieved by using cell-free fetal DNA in the plasma of RhD-negative mothers. For RhD-negative mothers carrying intact but dysfunctional RHD gene variants, the abundant maternal RHD sequences in maternal plasma could interfere with the fetal RHD allele detection. What does this study add? Digital PCR provides a high analytical specificity to noninvasively determine the fetal inheritance of RHD allele in alloimmunized pregnancies involving maternal RHD variants.

Nucleic acid technology screening of Australian blood donors for hepatitis C and human immunodeficiency virus-1 RNA: comparison of two high-throughput testing strategies.

Background and Objectives The aim of this study was to compare the performance of two high‐throughput strategies for hepatitis C virus (HCV) and human immunodeficiency virus‐1 (HIV‐1) RNA nucleic acid technology (NAT) screening in a volunteer blood‐donor population.