ABSTRACT
Acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) is an acute liver decompensation that occurs within 4 weeks on the basis of chronic liver disease. At present, the treatments of ACLF include general supportive treatment, etiological treatment, prevention and treatment of complications, artificial liver treatment, and liver transplantation. Many studies suggest that stem cell therapy may become a new treatment for patients with ACLF. Our department has also tried the application of this treatment. Now, there are three cases of stem cell therapy for patients with ACLF by our department which will be briefly reported.
ABSTRACT
AIM: Antiviral drug-resistant HBV mutants are complex and currently partly understood. This study was performed to analyze the profile of hepatitis B virus (HBV) resistance mutations against nucleos(t)ide analogues (NAs) in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB). METHODS: This was a population-based cross-sectional study. Serum samples of 179 patients with virological breakthrough undergoing different NAs treatment were obtained between January 2008 and December 2012. The HBV reverse transcriptase region was sequenced and the following NAs-resistant changes including rtL80, rtI169, rtV173, rtL180, rtA181, rtT184, rtA194, rtS202, rtM204, rtN236 and rtM250 were analyzed. RESULTS: In this cohort, 21.2% (38/179) were genotypes B and 78.8% (141/179) were genotypes C; and 89.4% (160/179) of them detected NAs-resistant mutations. The prevalence of HBV mutations at rtM204 was 93.0% (106/114) in patients with lamivudine (LAM) or telbivudine (LdT)-based therapies, and that of rtN236 mutations was 76.1% (35/46) in patients with adefovir dipivoxil (ADV)-based therapies. Among LAM/LdT based therapies, HBV rtM204I was significantly associated with HBV rtL80I/V mutations [rtM204I+rtL80I/V (50.0%, 32/64) vs. rtM204V+rtL80I/V (27.3%,9/33), P=0.032]; while the HBV rtM204V mutations was significantly associated with HBV rtL180M mutations [rtM204V+rtL180M (100%, 33/33) vs. rtM204I+rtL180M (60.9%, 39/64), P<0.001]. Additionally, HBV rtA181 mutations were observed in 19.3% (22/114) of patients with LAM/LdT-based therapy and 23.9% (11/46) of patients with ADV-based therapy. CONCLUSIONS: Majority of virological breakthrough is associated with NAs-resistant HBV, and the mutation patterns of NAs-resistant HBV are complicated in real clinical practice.