[The role of staphylococcal superinfection in viral hepatitis]

Viral hepatitis A was diagnosed in 69.35 percent of the 124 patients with viral hepatitides aged 15 to 62, 54.1 percent of these females and 45.9 percent males, and viral hepatitis B in 30.65 percent. The disease course varied in severity, was typical in all cases; the icteric form was observed in all the patients. An unfavorable pyoinflammatory premorbid background was present in 1/3 of the examinees. The studies have revealed that a staphylococcal superinfection with the icteric syndrome contributed to the pathogenesis of viral hepatitis. Antistaphylococcal agglutinins were detected in 65.6 percent of hepatitis A and in 73.7 percent of hepatitis B patients, and alpha antitoxins in 81.1 and 71.0 percent of patients, respectively. The disease severity correlated with high antitoxin titers, high antitoxin titers with a delayed convalescence of viral hepatitis A patients. Changes in the titers of antistaphylococcal agglutinins in hepatitis B patients were not rapid and their time course correlated with the terms of liver function recovery. The author comes to a conclusion that bacterial superinfection contributes to the pathogenesis of viral hepatitides, staphylococcal infection among other ones, that essentially influences the disease course.