Evaluation of a rapid test kit for detection of HBsAg/eAg in whole blood: a possible method for pre-donation testing

Abstract

In main developing countries, where hepatitis B is endemic . positivity rate for HBsAg in donor blood is high, and in some places, up to 2 0 % of donated blood has to be discarded for being HBsAg positive. This degree of wastage may be financially crippling for some developing countries. Pre-donation testing may be useful, so that donors who test HBsA g positive are deferred and wastage of costly blood bags is reduced. The study is to evaluate the suitability of the AMRAD kit. for pre-donation testing.for HBsAg. One hundred and one (101) hcallln blood donors wer e screene d for HBsAg/eAg using the test kit. The same specimens were screened using Monolisa (ELISA) kits for HBsAg and c Ag as the standard. True positive (TrP). False negative (FN). True negative (TrN). and false positive (FP) values were then found, from which, sensitivity, and specificity were derived. The AMRAD test kit detected 93 specimen s as negative and 8 specimens as positive for HBsAg . as against 94 negatives (TrN) and 7 positives (TrP) by monolisa . Thus, one false positive (FP) result was found in using the kit while no false negative (FN) occurred. T h e findings in this preliminary study suggest that AMRA D kit may be a useful predonation screening test for HBsAg