Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C and HIV seroprevalence in critically ill emergency medicine department patients in a tertiary inner city hospital in Istanbul, Turkey

Emergency medicine staff is working at risk of blood-borne infections during their daily practice every time. The risk of transmission is higher when dealing with critically ill patients. Our objective was to find out the prevalence of Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, and HIV, in critically ill red-coded emergency department patients. The study was carried out as prospective observational study between 1 September 2012 and 31 January 2013 in a tertiary inner city hospital emergency department in Istanbul, Turkey. Red triage coded patients managed in resuscitation room were enrolled. One thousand patients were included during the study period. Fifty of them were HBV positive. Eighteen patients were HCV positive and 2 had both HBV and HCV. HIV was not recorded. Forty one of them were trauma patients. There were 226 unconscious or uncooperative patients. Prior blood transfusion history was present in 92 of the patients and among them 11 had HBV and 3 had HCV. Four patients or their relatives were aware of their HCV positivity. HBV positivity was already known by the patients or their relatives. Total HBV vaccination ratio was 7.4%. Prevalence of HCV (1.8%) and HBV(5%) seroprevalence in our study group was very low which correlated with the recent literature regarding the Turkish population. HIV was not detected during the study period. This may also be accepted as consistent with the very low number of reported cases in Turkey.