Evaluation of Pre-donation Deferral Causes in Whole Blood Donor Population at a Tertiary Rural Health Centre

Blood safety and transfusion is one of the major issues in transfusion medicine. Whole blood donor deferrals lead to loss of precious blood donors and blood units available for transfusion purposes. The objective of this study is to evaluate the reasons for donor deferral, and also to guide the proposed donor education and recruitment programme. Of the pre-donation blood donors (n= 933), the total deferrals were 9.11% (n=85). Temporary deferrals (75.29%) were more common than permanent deferral (24.71%). The most common reason for temporary deferral was low hemoglobin (34.1%) followed by hypotension (14.1%) and in permanent deferral; the causes were hypertension (9.41%) and cardiac illness (7.06%). Thus, it is important to evaluate the spectrum of causes of whole blood donor deferral to guide the recruitment and retention efforts at rural level.