Molecular virology in transfusion medicine laboratory.

Abstract

and antibody to HBV core antigen (anti-HBc) testing began in the 80s to reduce transmission of non-A, non-B viral hepatitis. Then, the advent of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic and the rapidly following identification of hepatitis C virus (HCV) triggered unprecedented efforts to avoid the transmission of these new blood-borne viruses, and the implementation of antibody assays for both of these agents. To exclude individuals at risk for transmissible viral infection, donor screening process has been developed and implemented that includes the medical history of the candidate donor, a brief physical examination, and serologic testing. The next critical step in reducing viral TTI was achieved with the implementation of NAT technology 2 . Rapid progress and constant improvements in nucleic acid amplification technologies resulted in an unprecedented technological turning point in the molecular diagnostic and characterisation of viral infections. NAT combines the advantages of direct and highly sequence-specific detection of viral genomes (DNA or RNA) with an analytic sensitivity that is several orders of magnitude greater than that of antigen detection or virus isolation methods. Adequate specificity and high sensitivity combined with high throughput and the increasing availability of commercial assays, made NAT particularly suitable to screen blood donations for the presence of viral genomes. However, the considerable cost of NAT and challenges in automation led the users to develop strategies based on pooling of multiple donor samples

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