Relationship between diversity of hepatitis C virus quasispecies and viremia, activity of liver disease and response to interferon therapy / 中华实验和临床病毒学杂志

<p><b>BACKGROUND</b>To determine the relationship between diversity of hepatitis C virus quasispecies and viremia, activity of liver disease and response to interferon therapy.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>HCV quasispecies heterogeneity in 68 patients with chronic hepatitis C were detected by single stranded conformational polymorphism (SSCP) analysis of the HCV E2 hypervaribale region 1 (HVR1); of these, 48 were subsequently treated with interferon-alpha for 6 months.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>HVR1 was amplified in 61 patients. The average number of SSCP bands was 6.2+/-2.4. Quasispecies heterogeneity significantly correlated with serum HCV RNA levels (P<0.01), but not with serum ALT, AST levels and histological activity index (P>0.05). Of the patients who received interferon therapy, 43 were HVR1 positive. Patients who gained sustained response (n=11) had lower pre-treatement quasispecies heterogeneity (3.3+/-1.2) compared to those who had complete end-of-treatment response (ETR) with relapse (6.3+/-2.2, n=12, P<0.5) or no response (8.0+/-3.3, n=20, P<0.01). At the end of treatment, HVR1 could still be detected in 16 patients. The number of quasispecies heterogeneity in these patients decreased to 3.4+/-1.2, which was significantly lower than that in the patients who didn't receive interferon therapy (6.8+/-2.5, P<0.01). Of these 16 patients, 10 had change in quasispecies patterns.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>Increased quasispecies heterogeneity can cause high HCV viremia, but it is not related to severity of liver disease. Quasispecies heterogeneity is another marker to predict the response to interferon-alpha in patients with chronic hepatitis C.</p>

Effect of viral factors and host cellular immunity on the response to interferon in the patients with chronic hepatitis C / 中华传染病杂志

Objective To determine the influence of viral factors and host cellular immunity on the response to interferon in the patients with chronic hepatitis C. Methods Forty patients with chronic hepatitis C were treated with interferon ?. The relationships between response to interferon a and HCV genotype, quasispecies heterogeneity, HCV RNA level and HCV specific cytotoxic T lymphocyte (HCV CTL) activity in the liver were analyzed. Results After 6 months of therapy, 21 patients had obtained end of treatment response (ETR), 10 Patients of which had obtained sustained response (SR). The other 19 patients got no response (NR). ETR rate in patients with genotype HCV1 infection (43.3%, 13/30) was significantly lower than that in patients with non HIV1 infection (80%, 8/10) [ P