Pregnancy outcome of women transfused during pregnancy with blood products inadvertently obtained from donors treated with acitretin Acitretin and blood transfusions J. Y. Han et al.

We assessed the pregnancy outcome of nine women inadvertently transfused with acitretin-contaminated blood products in South Korea. A total of 18 women matched to cases by age, gravidity, and singleton- or twin-pregnancy, and who were transfused with blood products not contaminated with acitretin, was also recruited. There were nine babies born in the case group. No differences (p>0.05) were observed between cases and controls in the gestational age at delivery (38.3±1.6 weeks vs 37.8±2.2 weeks), birth weight (3,146±874g vs 3,106±568g), rate of pre-term deliveries (22.2 vs 11.1) and rate of low birth weight (<2,500g) (33.3 vs 16.7). There was no case of malformation or neurological abnormalities born in either group. In conclusion, inadvertent exposure to acitretin-contaminated blood products was not associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes, probably because of the removal of acitretin and etretinate during the manufacturing process of blood products.