INTRODUCTION Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) negatively impacts the natural history of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, including replication. We determined the prevalence of HBeAg in HIV/HBV co-infected patients compared to HBV mono-infected controls and further investigated the relationship between HBeAg seropositivity and the degree of HIV-induced immunosuppression in co-infected patien...

UNLABELLED Alpha interferon is the only licensed drug for hepatitis B with immunomodulatory as well as viral inhibitory properties. Potential advantages of interferon compared to nucleoside analogs include a lack of drug resistance, a finite and defined treatment course, and a higher likelihood for hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) clearance. Approximately 30% of hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg)...

TO THE EDITOR—We greatly appreciate the editorial commentary by Schwarz [1], which provided a comprehensive overview of the impact of our study on the universal hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccination program in Taiwan [2]. It was pointed out that the 8 infants who were born to mothers positive for HBV e antigen (HBeAg) and some of the infants born to HBeAg-negative mothers developed acute HBV infe...

BACKGROUND The reduction of hepatitis B virus replication to minimal levels is emerging as key therapeutic goal in chronic hepatitis B (CHB). OBJECTIVES This study aimed to evaluate and compare the efficacies of adefovir (ADV) and entecavir (ETV) in CHB. PATIENTS AND METHODS In this prospective study, 100 naïve patients were assigned to treatment with ADV (33 HBeAg-positive and 19 HBeAg-neg...

PURPOSE Lamivudine is known to be very effective in suppressing hepatitis B virus replication and virus induced necroinflammation. The aim of this study was to evaluate lamivudine therapy efficacy, predictive factors, breakthrough, prevalence of YMDD mutation, and relapse rate in Korean children with chronic hepatitis B. MATERIALS AND METHODS Between August 1999 and February 2005, 60 children...

background tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (tdf) is a new effective treatment option for patients with chronic hepatitis b (chb). objectives to evaluate tdf efficacy in nucleos(t)ide analogues (nas)-naive iranian patients with chb. patients and methods the na-naive patients received tdf for at least six months. the primary endpoint was the proportion of patients achieving a complete virological r...

OBJECTIVES Liver biopsy is indispensable because liver stiffness measurement alone cannot provide information on intrahepatic inflammation. However, the presence of fibrosis highly correlates with inflammation. We constructed a noninvasive model to determine significant inflammation in chronic hepatitis B patients by using liver stiffness measurement and serum markers. METHODS The training se...

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is a partially double-stranded DNA virus, which is a major causative agent of chronic, acute hepatitis, liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma in Asian, African and Southern European countries. An estimated 350 to 400 million carriers are found around the world (Wang et al., 2005) and 1 to 2 million people have died from this virus (Mahoney, 1999). In India the pre...