Glossary of terms

Repeat donors: A donor who has given blood before.

Donation interval: Interval from the date of the previous donation.

Reactive donations: Seropositive result on screening. It is checked in duplicate and, if reactivity is confirmed, the donation is discarded and supplementary tests are performed. A reactive result is considered "confirmed positive" if supplementary tests indicate a true infection.

Window period or seroconversion interval: Period between a non-reactive blood donation and a repeat blood donation confirmed positive (reactive) screened by the same test. When sensitive tests are used, the window period is the main source of seronegative transmission of disease.

Incident cases: Donors undergoing seroconversion. They represent "new infections".

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