Clinical analysis of HBV-infected patients with genotype C

Abstract

AIM: To investigate the distribution of hepatitis B virus (HBV) genotypes in Yan’an region of China, and to examine the relationship between the clinical types of the patients infected with HBV genotype C and the clinical virological and biochemical outcome of chronic HBV infection. METHODS: One hundred and twenty-two chronic HBV-infected patients with HBV DNA positive and a disease history of more than 12 months were randomly selected from Yan’an region, and the genotypes were detected in 121 patients, consisting of 58 chronic asymptomatic HBV carriers (ASC), 46 chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients and 17 liver cirrhosis (LC) patients. Real time fluorescence quantitative polymerase chain reaction (FQ-PCR) and time-resolved fluoroim munoassay (TRFIA) were used to measure their HBV DNA contents and HBV marker quantity, respectively. Micro-PCR and hybridizationELISA were used to detect HBV genotypes. RESULTS: Of the 121 serum samples with detected genotypes, 116 were of genotype C (95.87%, 95%CI: 92.32%-99.42%). In the genotype C group, the HBV DNA level and HBeAg quantity were markedly higher in the ASC group than in the CHB group or the LC group (t = 3.94, 4.75, P = 0.000, 0.000; t = 4.82, 3.94, P = 0.000, 0.001). However, HBeAb quantity and ALT level were markedly lower in the ASC group than in the CHB or the LC group (t = 3.71, 12.09, P = 0.000, 0.000; t = 12.44, 7.81, P = 0.000, 0.000). No significant differences in HBV DNA level, HBeAg quantity or ALT level were observed between the CHB group and the LC group (P = 0.38, 0.58, 0.047); significant difference in age was observed among the ASC, CHB and LC groups (t = 5.07, 9.72, 4.99, P = 0.000, 0.000, 0.000) and the mean age in ASC group was the lowest ; the male percentage was significantly higher in ASC group than in CHB or in the LC group (χ