Safety and efficacy of subcutaneous hepatitis B immunoglobulin after liver transplantation: an open single-arm prospective study.

Life-long hepatitis B immunoglobulin (HBIG) administration is a main component of prophylactic strategy to prevent hepatitis B virus (HBV) reinfection after liver transplantation (LT). Long-term effects of HBIG treatment are known only for intravenous (IV) and intramuscular formulations. To evaluate safety and efficacy of self-administered SC HBIG, 135 LT patients receiving a 48-week treatment were analyzed. The dose of HBIG was 500 IU or 1000 IU if body weight was <75 kg or ≥75 kg, respectively. Patients were switched from the monthly IV HBIG treatment to weekly SC HBIG 2-3 weeks after the last IV dosage. All patients were able to SC self-injection after a single training. The treatment was effective in maintaining trough anti-HBs levels >100 IU/L. No severe drug-related side effects occurred. Fifteen injection-site small hematomas and four cases of mild itch occurred. At the end of the study, anti-HBs median titer was 232 IU/L (115-566 IU/L) and 97.8% of patients had an anti-HBs level >150 IU/L. Due to high mean level of anti-HBs titers observed during this study, individualized treatment schedules should be further investigated. In conclusion, SC HBIG for long-term prophylaxis of post-LT HBV reinfection resulted safe, well accepted, and effective in maintaining adequate anti-HBs levels.

[Prevalence of antibody to hepatitis C virus in hospital personnel]. / Prevalenza dell'anticorpo contro il virus dell'epatite C nel personale ospedaliero.

UNLABELLED: Prevalence of antibody to hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) has been widely investigated in many categories; however no data are available on hospital personnel. The aim of our study was to investigate whether hospital personnel are at risk for HCV infection. METHODS: sera collected during a prospective study on HBV infection in hospital workers done in our institution in 1985 were analyzed for the ELISA test for anti-HCV from Ortho Diagnostic System. Sera were stored at -20 degrees C and were never defrosted until tested. A population of a consecutive series of healthy volunteer blood donors was used as a control group. RESULTS: the anti-HCV prevalence was higher in hospital personnel, than in blood donors (4.5 versus 1.1, p less than 0.001, Odds Ratio 4.5, Confidence Limits 2.9-7.2). CONCLUSION: although anti-HCV is not an "ideal" test for epidemiological purposes, our study suggests that hospital personnel is at high risk for HCV infection.

Cancer antigen 125, tissue polypeptide antigen, carcinoembryonic antigen, and beta-chain human chorionic gonadotropin as serum markers of epithelial ovarian carcinoma.

Cancer antigen 125 (CA 125) is common to most epithelial ovarian tumors. Therefore, it is potentially a good marker of this disease. This hypothesis was evaluated by measuring the serum levels of CA 125 in 81 patients with ovarian cancer (25 with nonactive and 56 with active disease), in 105 patients of both sexes with nonovarian tumors, and in 171 healthy controls of both sexes. The serum levels of three other markers, tissue polypeptide antigen (TPA), carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), and human chorionic gonadotropin, beta subunit (beta-hCG), were also measured in the same 357 subjects. The results of this study clearly indicate the clinical irrelevance of both CEA and beta-hCG as tumor markers in ovarian carcinomas. Conversely, the clinical usefulness of CA 125 and TPA was confirmed. In particular, CA 125 and TPA showed comparable sensitivity, while CA 125 showed a higher specificity for ovarian cancer than TPA. The association of CA 125 with TPA was very useful in continuous observation of patients with active disease in order to evaluate the clinical effectiveness of the therapy. Moreover, for patients in clinical remission, the markers allowed early detection of a recurrence of the disease.

Serological markers of hepatitis B virus infection in healthy volunteer blood donors in Campania (Southern Italy).

The prevalence of hepatitis B virus (HBV) serological markers was determined in a prospective fashion by radioimmunoassay in 2,084 healthy volunteer blood donors. The results showed that 51.2% of the donors were positive for at least one marker, and the percentage of occurrence of each marker was: HBsAg 5.3, anti-HBs alone 1.7, anti-HBc alone 10.8, anti-HBs and anti-HBc 33.3. Because of the size of the problem this investigation strongly demands further studies on the potential role of blood positive for anti-HBc in transmitting HBV infection in our geographical area.