Original Article
Volume: 36 | Issue: 3 | Published: Sep 30, 2020 | Pages: 265 - 271 | DOI: 10.24911/BioMedica/5-106
Frequency of Thalassemia and Its Association with Hepatitis C Infection in Local Population of Pakistan
Authors: Ghulam Jilany Khan , Nadeem Reyaz , Muhammad Bahadur Baloch , Analisa Cassandra , Susanne Schlicht
Article Info
Authors
Ghulam Jilany Khan
Assistant Professor; Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, University of Central Punjab, Lahore-Pakistan.
Nadeem Reyaz
Associate Professor, Department of Pathology, Al-Aleem Medical College, Lahore-Pakistan.
Muhammad Bahadur Baloch
Senior Demonstrator, Department of Anatomy, Shalamar Medical & Dental College, Lahore-Pakistan.
Analisa Cassandra
Postdoc Fellow; Department of Clinical Oncology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya (50603), Kuala Lumpur-Malaysia.
Susanne Schlicht
Research Head Group; Department of Pharmacology, University of Cologne, Gleueler Strasse 24, 50931, Köln-Germany.
Publication History
Received: July 16, 2020
Revised: August 12, 2020
Accepted: September 14, 2020
Published: September 30, 2020
Abstract
Background and Objective: Thalassemia major or βeta-thalassemia is a hereditary blood disorder, necessitating continuous blood transfusions. Frequent blood transfusions often result in the development of hepatitis, hepatocellular carcinoma, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) and many other infectious diseases. Incidence of infection of viral hepatitis in thalassemia patients is majorly associated with infections in the donor population. The objective of this study was to ascertain the frequency of HCV infection in patients with thalassemia in Pakistan.
Methods: This study was conducted from January 2015 to September 2018 in various sections of Punjab and Sindh, Pakistan. A total number of 439 patients were enrolled in this study, samples of blood from the patients were collected and their Anti-HCV antibodies were evaluated by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA); HCV-RNA genome presentation was assessed by HCV-nested-real time-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for the confirmation.
Results: It was found that major population of the thalassemia patients were male (63%). While the female thalassemia population was almost twice in Sindh province as compared to Punjab. In present study, n = 187 were detected positive among those n = 168 were confirmed by PCR. Only 47% thalassemia patients were found vaccinated against hepatitis B whereas all HCV positive patients were not vaccinated, and (84.96%) thalassemia patients were from the family of first cousin marriage. The patients which are not vaccinated also had significant chance to acquire the viral infection (P < 0.001). Moreover there could be some gender and environmental or geographical factors associated with thalassemia that are yet to be
explored in detail.
Conclusion: Thalassemia patients carry major risk for acquiring transfusion associated infection
Keywords: β-thalassemia, Hepatitis C Virus, Hepatitis B vaccination, Human immunodeficiency virus, Enzyme-linked Immunoessay, Real time-polymerase chain reaction.
