Hepatitis Monthly
Volume:13 Issue: 3, Mar 2013

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a significant health problem throughout the world. Chronic form of the disease is found in about 75% to 85% of the newly infected individuals. The chronic infection may lead to severe forms including chronic liver disease, cirrhosis and with a higher mortality rate, hepatocellular carcinoma. Since no vaccine has yet been developed against HCV, there is an increasing need to take measures to control the spread of the infection. Therefore, epidemiologic study of the virus is important to manage and monitor the spread of the virus in the community.. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of hepatitis C seropositivity in the general population of Mashhad, northeast of Iran..Patients and Three thousand, eight hundred and seventy (3870) individuals living in the city of Mashhad were recruited using cluster sampling method. HCV seropositivity was determined with HCV antibody detection ELISA kit and was confirmed by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) method.. In this study the overall seroprevalence of hepatitis C was founded to be 0.2% by using ELISA method. However, the overall Hepatitis C virus infection prevalence was found to be 0.13% with RT-PCR method.. Our study suggested that the prevalence rate of Hepatitis C virus is below 1% in the general population of Mashhad..

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is one of the causes of fatty liver in adults and is currently the primary form of chronic liver disease in children and adolescents. However, the psychological outcome (i.e. the behavioural problems that can in turn be related to psychiatric conditions, like anxiety and mood disorders, or lower quality of life) in children and adolescents suffering of NAFLD has not been extensively explored in the literature.. The present study aims at evaluating the emotional and behavioural profile in children suffering from NAFLD and the quality of life in their mothers..Patients and A total of 57 children (18 females/39 males) with NAFLD were compared to 39 age-matched control children (25 females/14 males). All participants were submitted to the following psychological tools to assess behavior, mood, and anxiety: the Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children (MASC), the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), and the Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI). Moreover, the mothers of 40 NAFLD and 39 control children completed the World Health Organization Quality of Life-BREF (WHOQOL-BREF) questionnaire.. NAFLD children scored significantly higher as compared to control children in MASC (P = 0.001) and CDI total (P < 0.001) scales. The CBCL also revealed significantly higher scores for NAFLD children in total problems (P = 0.046), internalizing symptoms (P = 0.000) and somatic complaints (P < 0.001). The WHOQOL-BREF revealed significantly lower scores for the mothers of NAFLD children in the overall perception of the quality of life (P < 0.001), and in the “relationships” domain (P = 0.023).. Increased emotional and behavioural problems were detected in children with NAFLD as compared to healthy control children, together with an overall decrease in their mothers’ quality of life. These results support the idea that these patients may benefit from a psychological intervention, ideally involving both children and parents, whose quality of life is likely negatively affected by this disease..

Blood-borne viruses such as hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) have some common epidemiological characteristics, and have infected millions of people throughout the world. Patients infected by acute hepatitis or HIV infections may not be aware of the disease, and thereby cause transmission to others. During haircut, shave, or pedicure, barbers may accidentally expose to their clients’ blood, transmit their own infection to them, or transmit the infection from one client to another. Thus the beauty salon staff has a potential role in expansion of infections.. As being barbers and barbering are risk factors to some infectious diseases, determining the role of knowledge and awareness of barbers and hairdressers about topics related to AIDS, and hepatitis B and C is important..Patients and This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed in 2010-2011 on 281 women’s beauty salons located in eleven urban districts of Isfahan town. A multistage cluster sampling was performed and knowledge assessment questionnaire accompanied by practice checklist regarding hepatitis B and C, and AIDS were completed by trained interviewers. Knowledge and practice scores were determined in 0-20 and 0-10 scales, respectively. The content validity of questionnaire was confirmed by three expert opinions and the test-retest reliability of the questionnaire was determined to be 0.83 in a pilot study on 30 participants. Data were analyzed using Pearson’s correlation coefficient and one-way ANOVA test by SPSS software, version 18.. In the study, 281 hairdressers participated. There was a statistically significant relationship between education level and knowledge score of hairdressers (P < 0.001). We found a statistically significant relationship between knowledge level and job history of hairdressers according to the Pearson’s correlation coefficient (P = 0.004). The results did not show any statistically significant relationship between education level and practice scores (P = 0.5). Furthermore, the job history of hairdressers and their practice score did not show a significant relationship (P = 0.77).. We obtained promising results about the knowledge and practice levels of staffs of women’s beauty salons in Isfahan about AIDS, and hepatitis B and C. The target group exhibited an intermediate level of knowledge about the diseases because of important role of barbers in virus transmission; we should provide the best control, evaluation, and continuous teaching programs..

Presence of occult hepatitis B infection (OBI) renders HBs antigen (HBsAg) undetectable by ELISA. Therefore it is valuable to evaluate the frequency of OBI among healthy blood donors to improve and perhaps change the strategies of blood screening to reduce the risk of HBV transmission.. The aim of this study was to determine the presence of HBcAb and HBV DNA among Iranian HBsAg negative healthy blood donors who donated their blood to the Tehran Blood Transfusion Center during 2011..Patients and 1000 serum specimens negative for HBsAg, HCV antibody and HIV antibody were collected from healthy blood donors and tested for HBcAb. Presence of hepatitis B viral DNA was checked in HBcAb positive samples by nested PCR with two sets of primers to amplify part of HBV S gene.. There were 64 women and 936 men in the population under study. The mean ± SD age of the donors was 38 ± 11 years. 80 out of 1000 samples (8%) were found to be positive for HBcAb. HBV DNA was detected in 50% of HBcAb positive specimens. The mean ± SD age of donors without HBV DNA was 37.7 ± 10.5 years and for donors with HBV DNA was 40.9 ± 11.2 years (P = 0.05).. OBI was prevalent among 50% of HBcAb positive healthy blood donors. The frequency of positive HBcAb among healthy HBsAg negative blood donors was comparable to previous studies reported from Iran. On the other hand, the frequency of HBV DNA in HBsAg negative blood donors was higher than previous reports..