Related Experiment Videos
[Correlation between serum globulin levels and hepatitis C virus antibody]
J Poniachik1, M Velasco, C Hurtado
1Centro de Gastroenterología, Hospital Clínico de la Universidad de Chile, Santiago de Chile.
Background:
some studies have suggested that the elevation of serum globulins in patients with chronic autoimmune hepatitis, paraproteinemias and rheumatoid arthritis could affect the determination of false positive hepatitis C virus antibodies (anti-HCV).
Aim:
to study the relationship between positive anti-HCV and serum levels of globulins in patients with liver disease.
Patients And Methods:
one hundred thirty one patients with liver disease, 49 alcoholic, 38 cryptogenetic, 17 autoimmune and 27 with other causes, were studies prospectively measuring simultaneously anti-HCV and serum levels of total, gamma and immuno-globulins (IgA, IgG and IgM). These levels were compared between anti-HCV positive and negative groups and correlated with the ratio between serum optical density/cutoff optical density of the anti HCV assay.
Results:
Twenty eight patients (21.3%) were anti-HCV positive, no differences in serum globulins between these patients and anti-HCV negative patients and no correlations between serum globulins and anti-HCV optical densities were observed.
Conclusions:
the hypergamma-globulinemia observed in these patients with liver diseases would not be responsible for positive hepatitis C virus antibodies.