Antibodies to Hepatitis C Virus in Patients on Haemodialysis

Dr. M.C. Alonso, Servicio de Nefrologia, Hospital Clinico Universitario, C/Galeras S/N, Santiago de Compostela (Spain) Dear Sir, Non-A, Non-B hepatitis is a common and serious consequence of blood transfusion. It has been associated with chronicity in at least half the patients with acute hepatitis and 20% of those with chronic hepatitis have histologic evidence of cirrhosis [1]. Recently a togavirus-like agent has been isolated and identified as the major etiologic virus of human non-A, non-B hepatitis [2]; this virus has been named hepatitis C (HCV); both radioim-mune and enzyme-linked assays have been developed to detect circulating antibodies to hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) [3J. We have studied the prevalence of anti-HCV in a population of 30 patients on chronic haemodialysis using an enzyme immunoassay; the results (table 1) have been correlated with age, time on haemodialysis, number of transfusions/patient and serum levels of aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and γ-glutamyltransferase. Eight patients (27%) were Table 1. Differences between anti-HCV-positive and anti-HCV-negative patients