{"doi":"10.1111/trf.15815","title":"Blood transfusion safety in the country of Georgia: collateral benefit from a national hepatitis C elimination program","abstract":"BACKGROUND: In April 2015, the government of Georgia (country) initiated the world's first national hepatitis C elimination program. An analysis of blood donor infectious screening data was conducted to inform a strategic plan to advance blood transfusion safety in Georgia. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: Descriptive analysis of blood donation records (2015-2017) was performed to elucidate differences in demographics, donor type, remuneration status, and seroprevalence for infectious markers (hepatitis C virus antibody [anti-HCV], human immunodeficiency virus [HIV], hepatitis B virus surface antigen [HBsAg], and Treponema pallidum). For regression analysis, final models included all variables associated with the outcome in bivariate analysis (chi-square) with a p value of less than 0.05. RESULTS: During 2015 to 2017, there were 251,428 donations in Georgia, representing 112,093 unique donors; 68.5% were from male donors, and 51.2% of donors were paid or replacement (friends or family of intended recipient). The overall seroprevalence significantly declined from 2015 to 2017 for anti-HCV (2.3%-1.4%), HBsAg (1.5%-1.1%), and T. pallidum (1.1%-0.7%) [p < 0.0001]; the decline was not significant for HIV (0.2%-0.1%). Only 41.0% of anti-HCV seropositive donors underwent additional testing to confirm viremia. Infectious marker seroprevalence varied by age, sex, and geography. In multivariable analysis, first-time and paid donor status were associated with seropositivity for all four infectious markers. CONCLUSION: A decline during the study period in infectious markers suggests improvement in blood safety in Georgia. Areas that need further improvement are donor recruitment, standardization of screening and diagnostic follow-up, quality assurance, and posttransfusion surveillance.","journal":"Transfusion","year":2020,"id":79411,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":16,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.7957,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":413025,"name":"Eteri Kipiani","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369409,"name":"Shaun Shadaker","orcid":"0000-0002-5772-7046","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":412307,"name":"Maia Alkhazashvili","orcid":"0000-0002-1702-2308","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369411,"name":"Lia Gvinjilia","orcid":"0000-0002-2574-3957","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":370452,"name":"Tinatin Kuchuloria","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":409719,"name":"Nazibrola Chitadze","orcid":"0000-0002-6910-5447","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":399935,"name":"Sheila M. Keating","orcid":"0000-0002-8324-3694","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369410,"name":"Amiran Gamkrelidze","orcid":"0000-0002-9767-978X","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":413026,"name":"Alexander Turdziladze","orcid":null,"position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369413,"name":"Vladimer Getia","orcid":"0000-0001-9337-1908","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":370451,"name":"Muazzam Nasrullah","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369418,"name":"Francisco Averhoff","orcid":"0000-0003-0810-1212","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":413027,"name":"Mariam Izoria","orcid":null,"position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":413028,"name":"Beth Skaggs","orcid":null,"position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":227514,"name":"Evan M. Bloch","orcid":"0000-0001-8181-9517","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":35,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T21:50:33.748601Z","pmid":"32542715","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}