title: Prevalence of hepatitis C infection and schistosomiasis in Egyptian patients with hepatocellular carcinoma.
abstract: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection prevalence was determined in 34 hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients with underlying liver cirrhosis. Serum alfa-fetoprotein level was found to be more than 1000 ng/ml (3153 +/- 1451) in those patients. Anti-HCV antibodies were detected in 84% of patients sera negative for hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg), while HCV RNA was only detected in 28% of the sera of those patients. Schistosomiasis antibodies were found in 92% of the anti-HCV-positive HBsAg negative sera of HCC patients, while they were only detected in 61% of sera of control non HCC patients with anti-HCV antibodies and without HBsAg. HCV and hepatitis B virus (HBV) coinfection was found in 16% of the studied group, based on antibodies in sera, and in 9% based on the presence of HCV RNA. HBV (HBsAg) was found, on its own, in sera of 5.9% of the patients studied. These results show that HCV and schistosomiasis play a major role in the development of hepatocellular carcinoma in Egypt.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
authors.forename: G M
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Mabrouk
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D006528:Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / Q000209:etiology*; D004534:Egypt / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D006526:Hepatitis C / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006801:Humans; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000209:etiology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D012552:Schistosomiasis / Q000453:epidemiology*