Entecavir therapy in a hepatitis B-related decompensated cirrhotic

[Guest guest]

South Med J. 2008 Nov;101(11):1173-6.

Entecavir therapy in a hepatitis B-related decompensated cirrhotic patient.

Muneer B, Testa G, Millis JM, Mohanty SR.

Center for Liver Diseases, Section of Gastroenterology, University of Chicago,

Chicago, IL 60637-1463, USA.

A 58-year-old Arab-American male with HBeAg-negative chronic hepatitis B (HBV),

presented with decompensated cirrhosis and a high HBV DNA level. He responded to

entecavir with a significant reduction in serum HBV DNA level after 15 weeks of

therapy with entecavir. However, he developed a progressive rise in prothrombin

time/international normalized ratio (PT/INR) and bilirubin and underwent liver

transplantation after receiving 22 weeks of entecavir therapy. Furthermore, with

the continued use of combination entecavir and hepatitis B immunoglobulins

(HBIG), he showed improvement in his clinical status with a nondetectable serum

HBV DNA level 12 weeks after transplantation. He continued to maintain

nondetectable serum HBV DNA 2 years following transplantation. To the best of

our knowledge, this is the first reported case of a patient with decompensated

chronic HBV who responded to entecavir both before and after transplantation

without showing any evidence of recurrent HBV. Larger clinical trials are

recommended to compare both short-term and long-term efficacy using entecavir

among nucleoside-naïve decompensated chronic HBV patients before and after liver

transplantation.

PMID: 19088536 [PubMed - in process]

[Guest guest]

South Med J. 2008 Nov;101(11):1173-6.

Entecavir therapy in a hepatitis B-related decompensated cirrhotic patient.

Muneer B, Testa G, Millis JM, Mohanty SR.

Center for Liver Diseases, Section of Gastroenterology, University of Chicago,

Chicago, IL 60637-1463, USA.

A 58-year-old Arab-American male with HBeAg-negative chronic hepatitis B (HBV),

presented with decompensated cirrhosis and a high HBV DNA level. He responded to

entecavir with a significant reduction in serum HBV DNA level after 15 weeks of

therapy with entecavir. However, he developed a progressive rise in prothrombin

time/international normalized ratio (PT/INR) and bilirubin and underwent liver

transplantation after receiving 22 weeks of entecavir therapy. Furthermore, with

the continued use of combination entecavir and hepatitis B immunoglobulins

(HBIG), he showed improvement in his clinical status with a nondetectable serum

HBV DNA level 12 weeks after transplantation. He continued to maintain

nondetectable serum HBV DNA 2 years following transplantation. To the best of

our knowledge, this is the first reported case of a patient with decompensated

chronic HBV who responded to entecavir both before and after transplantation

without showing any evidence of recurrent HBV. Larger clinical trials are

recommended to compare both short-term and long-term efficacy using entecavir

among nucleoside-naïve decompensated chronic HBV patients before and after liver

transplantation.

PMID: 19088536 [PubMed - in process]