Epidemiology of hepatitis C virus infection in a tertiary care hospital

Abstract

BackgroundThere are epidemiological lacunae in literature of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. We report a prospective observational study of asymptomatic HCV infected patients from a tertiary care Government Hospital. MethodsAll consecutive asymptomatic antibodies to hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) positive patients were studied from July 2011 to April 2016. Patients were reviewed for demographic factors including symptom profile, risk factors, family screening, and point prevalence in relation to various districts of Punjab and Haryana. ResultsOne thousand twelve patients were studied with median age of 52 years (range:13–85) with a male to female ratio of 0.87. Eight hundred (79.25%) patients were from Punjab and 110 (10.67%) from Haryana. Forty percent patients were in 40–60 age group. Six hundred seventy patients (66.21%) did not have any apparent risk factor, 274 (27.08%) had one risk factor, and 68 patients (6.72%) had > 2 risk factors. Commonest risk factor was h/o surgery in 243 patients (24.01%), 32 patients had h/o IV drug abuse and 29 among them were < 30 years. Three hundred and sixty-seven families and children were screened, and 27 spouses and 16 children were found to be anti-HCV positive. The risk factor of IV drug abuse was more common in the younger adults with age ≤ 30 years as compared with age > 30 years (p = 0.001). ConclusionHCV infection was common in certain districts of Punjab and common in adults of 40–60 years. This finding needs to be confirmed in larger population-based study. The IV drug abuse is the risk factor of concern among young adults.