Increased alanine aminotransferase (ALT-SGPT) activity in Puerto Rican blood donors

Data was obtained from 4189 volunteer blood donation records in two hospital-based blood banks in Puerto Rico to determine whether Hispanics have higher serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT-SGPT) activity than donors from other racial-ethnic groups. The overall mean value of ALT-SGPT in the study population was 36.84 u/l (range 1-910, standard deviation 37.8). When the logarithm of ALT-SGPT (log ALT) was calculated for all subjects, the overall, mean for log ALT was 1.47 (range 1-2.96, standard deviation 0.27). Analysis of each blood bank's donation records at two different time periods showed a consistently high ALT-SGPT activity even when donations positive for hepatitis B surface antigen or other serologic markers were excluded. Though the causal factor of this finding is not clear, non-infectious environmental such as alcohol consumption should be considered as a probable explanation.