It was a cross-sectional retrospective record review. The study area was Bahawalpur division Pakistan, located in the south of the Punjab, where the patients mostly visit the Bahawal Vectoria hospital, Bahawalpur, Pakistan. All blood donors who donated blood for transfusion at Bahawal Vectoria hospital, Bahawalpur between Jan 2016 and Sep, 2016 were included in the study. Simple random sampling technique was used to select study units. The dependent variable of this study was HBsAg/HCsAg status. Socio-demographic characteristics: Sex, Age, Occupation, Residence were independent variables. Structured record review check list developed by investigator was used to collect secondary data from blood donors, register the data; extraction tool was prepared in English. Secondary data were collected by two experienced nurses who were working at the blood bank. The data collectors were trained on the data collection. The investigator supervised the data collection process. Data collectors and the supervisor were trained on the overall study design, objective of the study and data collection instrument and procedure. The investigator had checked the collected data for completeness and corrective measures had been taken accordingly including cross checking from registers. The collected data had been cleaned and coded before analysis. A descriptive analysis was done to determine the prevalence of hepatitis B & C virus in the study population and its distribution categorized by independent variables. Test of proportions was used to assess differences in proportion of hepatitis B & C virus infection among groups. All analyses were done using SPSS Statistics Data, Version 20.
3.1: Ethical considerations
The study proposal was approved by the Ethical Committee of University College of Conventional Medicine, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur. An informed written consent was taken from the head of the blood bank center of Bahawal Victoria Hospital Bahawalpur according to the declaration of Helsinki to get the secondary data. As the study was conducted through review of donors’ records, there was no harm to individual donors. Informed written consent was also taken from all the selected blood donors and those who were not willing to participate in the study were excluded from it. To preserve confidentiality, extraction of data from records was carried out by data collectors working in the blood bank service. There was no any personal identifier included in the data collection form. The data obtained had not been accessed by a third person, except the principal investigator. After fulfilling the above mentioned requirements and obtaining the permission, the data collection was preceded.