Prevalence of hepatitis c virus infection among multitransfused thalassemic children in Basrah – Iraq

摘要

Between November 1998 and May 1999 a prospective study for HCV antibodies was conducted on 200 patients (113 males and 87 females), with B-thalassemia major and sickle cell-thalassemia, who were attending the thalassemia center at Basrah Maternity and Children Hospital. Their ages ranged from 1-18 years with a mean age of 9 years. Nineteen patients (9.5%) were found to have antibodies in comparison to only one (0.5%) amongst the 200 children of a control group. The risk of exposure to HCV was higher than for HBs antigen and HIV amongst the same patients. Anti-HCV seropositivity was significantly higher amongst patients with B-thalassemia major than patients with sickle cell-thalassemia and patients older than 10 years. The study showed also that anti-HCV seropositivity was directly related to the frequency of blood transfusion and there were significant elevations of serum bilirubin and aminotransferase levels amongst seropositive thalassemic patients compared to seronegative patients.