Incidence of blood transfusion reactions in Eritrea: a retrospective cross-sectional study

Blood Transfusion is among the life-saving medical interventions that has significant impact in preventing and/or reducing mortality. It has however been associated with life-threatening adverse outcomes. In Eritrea, the burden of blood transfusion reaction is unknown. This study is conducted to estimate the incidence and determine the nature of blood transfusion reactions in all Eritrean hospitals using historical data. This was a retrospective descriptive cross-sectional study conducted in all Eritrean hospitals. Data was collected from all Eritrean hospitals’, Eritrean Pharmacovigilance Centre and the National Blood Transfusion Centre in Eritrea and entered and analyzed using CSPro and SPSS respectively. In the ten years period, a total of 87,655 blood and blood components were transfused and 37 cases of blood transfusion reactions (0.42 cases per 1000 transfusions) were documented. The median age of the study population was 27 years (interquartile range: 23) and reactions were mainly reported in females (68%). All but one of the reported blood transfusion reactions were acute and dominated by immunogenic febrile non-hemolytic transfusion reaction (37.8%) followed by allergic reaction (29.7%), anaphylaxis (10.8%), and hemolytic transfusion reaction other than ABO antibodies (8.1%). Almost all reactions were acute and majority of which were febrile non-hemolytic transfusion reaction. About one in four (24.3%) of the cases were serious and outcome was fatal in two cases. In conclusion, though the estimated incidence of blood transfusion reaction in Eritrea was found to be low, the seriousness of the cases urge establishment of a functional haemovigilance program.