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- Title
Serum Levels of Hepatitis C Virus Core Antigen as a Marker of Infection and Response to Therapy.
- Authors
Soffredini, Roberta; Rumi, Maria Grazia; Parravicini, Maria Luisa; Ronchi, Guido; Del Ninno, Ersilio; Russo, Antonio; Colombo, Massimo
- Abstract
OBJECTIVES: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) core antigen is a recently developed marker of hepatitis C infection. We compared the predictive power of HCV core antigen with reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and branched DNA assay for HCV-RNA as markers of infection and response to interferon therapy.METHODS: Four hundred and forty-four sera from 111 patients (65 men, 52 yr) with chronic hepatitis C, receiving ribavirin together with standard interferon (n= 61) or pegylated interferon (n= 50) were retrospectively investigated.RESULTS: Pretreatment, RT-PCR, branched DNA (median 621,887 IU/ml), and HCV core antigen (median 57 pg/ml) gave positive results in 100%, 99%, and 94% of the sera; the correlation between HCV core antigen and branched DNA was 0.75. The median HCV RNA level among the 7 of 111 (6%) patients that had a negative core Ag result was 15,016 IU/ml. Pretreatment levels of HCV core antigen were significantly lower in the 41 patients with a sustained virological response than in the 39 relapsers and 31 nonresponders (17 pg/ml, 114 pg/ml, 58 pg/ml;p-value 0.005). Independently of treatment schedule, wk 12 more than 2 log10 reduction of viremia or a negative result for HCV core antigen had 100% negative predictive value (NPV) for a response to therapy compared to 94% for negative RT-PCR. The positive predictive value (PPV) of HCV core antigen and branched DNA was only 47% and 48%.CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion, the HCV core antigen is a less sensitive test of HCV viremia than HCV-RNA assays and is competitive with the bDNA assay as an early predictor of a nonresponse.
- Subjects
HEPATITIS C virus; HEPATITIS C; BIOMARKERS; ANTIGENS; INTERNAL medicine; MEDICAL research
- Publication
American Journal of Gastroenterology (Springer Nature), 2004, Vol 99, Issue 9, p1738
- ISSN
0002-9270
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1572-0241.2004.30396.x