Genotyping of ABO blood group in Chinese Han population

Qiong YU; Guoguang WU; Yanlian LIANG; Yuqing SU

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND:

ABO is the most important blood group system for blood transfusion. Though widely used in determining ABO blood group for its simplicity and rapidity, serological technology has its inherent limitation, for which ABO genotyping provides a valuable alternative.

OBJECTIVE:

To study ABO gene polymorphism in Chinese Han population and apply ABO genotyping technique to solve serological problems in clinical practice of blood transfusion.

DESIGN:

Comparison of ABO genotyping results of random selected samples with those of routine serological phenotyping.

SETTING:

An institute of transfusion medicine in a municipal blood center.

PARTICIPANTS:

Totally 260 unrelated healthy Chinese blood donors of Han nationality were randomly selected in Shenzhen Blood Center from March to December in 2002, including 110 male and 150 female subjects aged between 18 and 50 years. A sample with discrepancy in serological ABO phenotype was from our blood center, and the donor' s family was investigated. Six samples suspected to be A2 phenotype by serological test were from four hospitals in Shenzhen including the Second People' s Hospital of Shenzhen.

METHODS:

The DNA was extracted from the peripheral blood by rapid salt fractionation, and subjected to polymerase chain reaction(PCR) with sequence-specific primers (PCR-SSP) to amplify the ABO gene for ABO genotyping. The alleles of the blood type difficult to determine were amplified with PCR-SSP on the basis of serologic tests including absorption and elution test and agglutination inhibition assay of salivary blood-group substances.MAIN OUTCOME

MEASURES:

Genotypes and phenotypes of the blood samples from 260 individuals and of the samples with serological ABO discrepancy.

RESULTS:

In the 260 Chinese Han individuals, in accordance with Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, the gene frequencies of O1, B, A1O1(A467c), A1O2/1O3(A467T) alleles were 0. 582 7, 0. 184 6, 0. 009 6, and 0. 2231, respectively. Two of the six individuals with difficulty of blood type determination and suspected to have A2 phenotype by serological tests proved to have A2O1O1 genotype, and the rest were all of A1O2/A1O3O1. Three children of a family with difficult identification were para-Bombay types, and their ABO types were A102B, A102B and A102O1, respectively.

CONCLUSION:

ABO PCR-SSP genotyping is simple, rapid and accurate and can be a valuable complement to serological identification.