Detection of Phenotype and Genotype of Duffy Blood Group in Thai Blood Donors

Abstract

The Duffy blood group system is important in many branches of medicine, especially blood transfusion and malariology. Serological methods are standard, and can be used to detect the phenotypes of blood groups. In parallel, use of polymerase chain reaction sequence specific primer (PCR SSP), a molecular method, is done to detect blood group genotype in cases where phenotyping detection cannot be done. Recently, the frequency of use of Duffy blood group and detection by PCR SSP in Thailand were rarely employed. To compare the reliability of PCR SSP with serological methods, the prevalence of different Duffy blood groups was analyzed. Two hundred EDTA blood samples were collected from Thai blood donors (Tak and Yala, Thailand). The frequency of Duffy phenotypes were 78.5% Fy(a+b−), 19.5% Fy(a+b+), and 2.0% Fy(a−b+). The frequency of Duffy genotypes were 76.0% FY*A/FY*A, 22.0% FY*A/FY*B, and 2.0% FY*B/FY*B. These results showed perfect agreement of the 2 methods (κ = 0.931). These results indicated that PCR-SSPs can be used as alternative method to analyze Duffy blood group, i.e., for screening and selecting appropriate blood for patients.