Afro-Egyp J Inf  End Dis  2011 Sep ;1(1):1-8

 

Study of autoantibodies in Egyptian non-B,non-C chronic hepatitis patients

 

Bahgat M, Emam M, Refaey MM, Abd-Eldayem WA,Emara MW, El-Sharkawy HI, Emara A, Heeba H, Akl MR

 

Tropical Medicine Department,Faculty of Medicine,Zagazig University,Egypt.

halazanfaly_2006@yahoo.com

 

                              

 

ABSTRACT

Background and study aim : Autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) is a curable disease that is under studied in our locality in Egypt and it's role in causation of chronic liver disease is not well studied. This work aimed at evaluation of the pattern and clinical importance of an array of auto-antibodies in non-B, non-C chronic hepatitis Egyptian patients and to detect the prevalence and feature of autoimmune liver diseases (AILDs) in our locality and evaluate other causes of chronic non-B, non-C hepatitis in our patients.

Patients and methods : Between January 2007 to September 2009, 50 Egyptian patients with non-B non-C chronic hepatitis were enrolled in this study (18 males and 32 females). All patients were subjected to the following : full history taking, through clinical examination, viral markers (HBsAg, Anti-HCV, HBC Ab), liver function tests, serum protein electrophoresis, abdominal ultrasonographic examination, fine needle liver biopsy and histopathology examination and tests for autoimmune antibodies ( ANA, ASMA, ALKM-I and AMA) and measuring their titer.

Results : Most patients were middle-age females (27.72+12.1) and the most common auto-antibodies detected in patients group were ANA (48%) followed by ASMA (44%), ALKM-1 (24%) and AMA (20%) .Out of the 50 patients; 32 patients (64%) were diagnosed as AILDs and 16 patients (32%) were diagnosed as autoimmune hepatitis (AIH), most of them (10 patients) were classified as type I AIH (with ANA and/or ASM), 2 patients (4%) were classified as type II AIH (with LKM-1) and 4 patients (8%) could not been classified on the basis of routine antibodies profile . 16 patients (32%) were diagnosed as overlap syndrome (AIH with cholestatic feature with or without AMA positive sera).

Conclusion : The present study concluded that the distribution of autoantibodies in different group of patients revealed the difficulty to endorse the subclassification of patients of AIH depending on autoantibodies profiles. The role of AIH needs more studies in our locality as it's one of the curable liver diseases.