Correlation of quantitative assay of HBsAg and HBV DNA levels during chronic HBV treatment

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Dig Dis Sci. 2008 Nov;53(11):2995-8. Epub 2008 Apr 12.

Correlation of quantitative assay of HBsAg and HBV DNA levels during chronic HBV

treatment.

Ozaras R, Tabak F, Tahan V, Ozturk R, Akin H, Mert A, Senturk H.

Department of Infectious Diseases, Cerrahpasa Medical Faculty, Istanbul

University, 34098, Cerrahpasa, Istanbul, Turkey.

rozaras@...

BACKGROUND AND AIM: Viral load is used for the diagnosis and monitoring the

treatment of chronic hepatitis B (CHB). These methods are molecular-based and

are expensive. Previous studies suggest that quantitative hepatitis B surface

antigen (HBsAg) studied by automated chemiluminescent microparticle immunoassay

can be a surrogate marker. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether

quantitative HBsAg correlates hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA levels during CHB

treatment. METHODS: The study included 18 patients (13 male, 5 female, mean age:

33 +/- 9 years) with CHB. They were given pegylated interferon +/- lamivudine

for 52 months and serum samples were obtained in weeks 0, 4, 8, 24, 48, 52, and

76. HBV DNA was measured by TaqMan polymerase chain reaction (PCR; Erasmus MC,

University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands). Quantitative HBsAg was

studied by automated chemiluminescent microparticle immunoassay (Architect

HBsAg, Abbott, IL). Results HBV DNA levels were measured as follows: 9.66, 7.69,

7.06, 5.93, 5.89, 5.88, and 7.27 logarithmic genome equivalent/ml, respectively.

The corresponding HBsAg quantitation results were 42,888, 31,176, 37,882,

27,277, 28,279, 29,471, and 31,535 IU/ml, respectively. They showed a

significant correlation (canonical correlation = 0.85). CONCLUSIONS: HBsAg

studied by automated chemiluminescent microparticle immunoassay correlates with

HBV DNA and can be a surrogate marker during the monitoring of the efficacy of

HBV treatment.

PMID: 18409002 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]