Incidence of adverse reaction in blood donation: a systematic review

There are a lot of reports related to adverse reactions post blood donation. The present study is designed to investigate the incidence of adverse reactions in blood donation around the world. This research was conducted through searching databases such as PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, EmBase, Ovid, as well as the specialized journal of TRANSFUSION without any time limit by using the keywords including Adverse Event, Adverse Effect, Adverse Reaction, Complication, Side Effect, Vasovagal Reaction, Local Reaction, General Reaction, Allergic Reaction, Blood Donor, and Blood Donation. In the initial search, 7054 documents were found, of which 2517 duplicates were excluded. After screening the remaining 4,537 documents, 97 one were reviewed for quality assessment, of which 30 with the appropriate quality were selected for the review process. The results of the study showed that the reactions caused by blood donation are very different. Most reactions were systemic, and ranged from 0.08 to 13 percent in different countries. The incidence of adverse reactions in blood donation differ across the countries which might be related to the donors' characteristics. The difference did even existed in studies conducted in the same country and the same year. This suggests that many factors can cause adverse reactions in blood donation, and that a wide range of them investigated in one study, most of which were systemic.