New marker for follow up of anti-HBV - retrospective study

Abstract

Hepatitis related to HBV manifests itself in many forms and can be treated with excellent results in the acute phase whereas, in the chronic phase, only a sustained immunological control (SIC) in time can be achieved. The current gold standard test for therapy is the quantitative HBV DNA which, by itself, does not allow an assessment of the SIC. For the reason we did a retrospective study of 13 patients over a 19 month period during which we simultaneously evaluated both HBV DNA and the new marker: quantitative HbsAg; this test was carried out in house. The relationship that exists between the markers and which could provide the clinician with more information was evaluated in three types: High similarity, Low similarity, No similarity between the performance curves of the two markers probably connected by many types of therapeutic answers: sustained immunological control, low immunological control and no immunological control.

Keywords

• Chronic hepatitis B, Quantitative HbsAg, Sustained Immunological Control (SIC)