ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Infectious Diseases: Epidemiology and Prevention
Blood Bank Trends in Kuwait: Five-Year Analysis of Donations and Investigations
Provisionally accepted
- 1Kuwait University College of Allied Health Sciences, Sulaibikhat, Kuwait
- 2Kuwait Ministry of Health, Sulaibikhat, Kuwait
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BACKGROUND: Reliable national transfusion services require continuous surveillance of donation activity, inventory losses, transfusion-transmissible infection (TTI) screening, and immunohematology workload. Kuwait's centralized service is coordinated by the Kuwait Central Blood Bank (KCBB). STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: We performed a retrospective analysis of officially requested KCBB annual reports (January 2019–December 2023). Collated variables included donation volumes, donor sex and ABO/RhD distribution, discarded components, and NAT screening outcomes for HBV, HCV, and HIV. Patient-side indicators comprised total immunohematology samples, antibody screening/identification, antenatal testing, and alloantibody profiles. The analysis was descriptive, presenting distributions and temporal trends without inferential testing. RESULTS: Donations averaged ~82,000 annually, with a decline during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020–2021) and recovery to ~85,000 in 2023. Male donors accounted for >85% of donations. O RhD⁺ positive (38.7%) and B RhD⁺ positive (23.7%) were the most common blood groups, while RhD-negative donors comprised 8.6%. Wastage varied yearly, predominantly impacting fresh frozen plasma. NAT-reactive TTI prevalence remained low: HBV 0.06–0.11% (60–110 per 100,000), HCV 0.03–0.08% (30–80 per 100,000), and HIV 0.02–0.05% (20– 50 per 100,000) annually. Immunohematology workload (total samples and test activity) fell during 2020–2021 and increased again by 2023. A wide spectrum of clinically significant alloantibodies was identified, most frequently within the Rh, Kell, and Kidd systems, with additional MNS and P1PK specificities. Among antenatal samples, antibody positivity averaged 3.8% (peak 4.7% in 2021); anti-D predominated, followed by anti-K. DISCUSSION: KCBB data highlight persistent male predominance among donors, RhD-negative scarcity (8.6%), and variable component wastage, especially FFP. These findings support targeted donor-recruitment strategies, obstetric–transfusion planning for RhD-negative supply, and strengthened inventory management to improve resilience and safety of Kuwait's blood supply.
Keywords: Kuwait Central Blood Bank, Blood utilisation, Antenatal testing, Alloantibodies, Transfusion transmissible infection (TTI)
Received: 28 Sep 2025; Accepted: 25 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Almuaili, Abdullah and Al-Awadhi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Dalal Almuaili
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