Active clinical trials for "Hepatitis"

According to the centres taking part in the ALHICE survey, the number of HIV-HCV co-infected women is currently decreasing. This drop was first noted in 2006 and persisted in 2007. What might have been considered a chance phenomenon during the first year (2006) was confirmed in the beginning of 2008. In view of this information, the investigators wished to ascertain the reality of this trend and to investigate its causes, by attempting to answer the following questions: - Has the prevalence of risk factors for HCV infection changed among the general population over the past 10 years? Has the prevalence of risk factors for HCV infection changed among HIV/HCV co-infected women over the past 10 years? Is the change in the number of co-infected women who gave birth during the past 10 years related to the prevalence of certain risk factors among this population? Is the change in the number of co-infected women who gave birth during the past 10 years related to a decrease in certain risk factors for HCV infection among the general population? Have changes in addictive behaviour among women of child-bearing age played a role in the decreasing number of HCV-contaminated children? Furthermore, follow-up data from HCV-infected children born during this period will provide information concerning the course of HCV infection. The objectives are to study trends in numbers of deliveries among HCV/HIV co-infected women as well as trends in risk factors for HCV infection among women of child bearing age and lastly to create a cohort of HCV infected children.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been the leading cause of cancer death in Taiwan. Though Alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) and des-γ-carboxy prothrombin(DCP) are used as the tumor markers for diagnosis of HCCs. Thus, these two markers are not good enough for the early detection of small HCCs. To improve the survival, further investigations of the early diagnostic markers are still needed. SELDI is a proteomic profiling techniques in biomarker discovery. Its approach has been successfully used to identify biomarkers of various cancers, such as prostate cancer, bladder cancer, ovarian cancer, lung cancer, colon cancer, breast cancer and pancreatic cancer. In this current project we will apply the SELDI technique to identify the HCC biomarkers. Sera samples from the HCC patients and relevant controls will be collected. We hope that we can find the new HCC biomarkers. If biomarkers of HCC are identified, this can be used to clinical application for the possible early detection of HCCs.

Taiwan has launched a successful nationwide neonatal hepatitis B immunization since July 1, 1984. It successfully decreased the incidence of hepatitis B virus infection, the hepatitis B carrier rate as well as liver diseases among children and adolescents. The sexual transmission route is another important way of hepatitis B infection aside from the mother and child vertical infection, especially for youth and adults. Hepatitis B vaccination cohort refers to those who were born after 1986 and received hepatitis B vaccine immunization during newborn period. They are gradually entering into young adults and adolescent age. Among them, there is no empirical evidence to show the actual infection rate and to help implement hepatitis B vaccine booster policy for those who had three seronegative viral markers of hepatitis B. Therefore, the study design is to collect three consecutive years graduate school students school entry health examination data and undergo three hepatitis B viral markers checkup and blood types. The data linkage includes their health checkup data in the freshmen period, Taiwan CDC databank for neonatal hepatitis B immunization records, pregnancy and birth record registry, Taiwan cancer registry and Taiwan death record registry.

It is estimated that 350-400 million people worldwide are chronically infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV). Cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma are major complications of chronic HBV infection and are responsible of about 500,000 deaths each year. Although some predictive factors of the outcome of chronic HBV infection were reported, it remains needed to more precisely determine the factors which are associated with the outcome in non-selected patients. Indeed, these factors should help to identify patients who are likely to have a better or worse evolution of their chronic HBV infection over time and thus, to adapt their clinical management and monitoring.Therefore, our purpose is to constitute a "real-life" cohort of non-selected patients to create a database of epidemiological, clinical, biological, virological and therapeutic parameters, in order to determine factors associated with the outcome of chronic HBV infection.

The linkage between viral hepatitis and renal failure is complex. The current study aims to exlore the long-term prevalence of viral hepatitis among uremic patients in Taiwan

Hepatitis E is the fifth known human viral hepatitis and is probably the most common cause of acute viral hepatitis in the world. The incidence of acute hepatitis E is estimated at 3 million human cases per year worldwide, with around 70,000 deaths. Most cases occur in endemic countries, but the number of cases in low-endemic areas has increased. HEV seroprevalence is high in developing countries, such as India and Southeast Asia, ranging from 27-80%. Acute disease mortality is 1-4%, with risk being higher in pregnant women and immunodeficient patients. The four more prevalent genotypes are allocated into two groups. Epidemic hepatitis E includes genotypes 1 and 2, which are considered human viruses and have caused the epidemics of hepatitis. These forms are transmitted mainly by contaminated water and the fecal-oral route. endemic hepatitis E includes genotypes 3 and 4, which are considered swine viruses (common in domestic and wild pigs), capable of infecting humans as an accidental host and therefore considered zoonotics. The course and clinical presentation of hepatitis E is highly variable. The detailed mechanisms that lead to the different clinical outcomes in hepatitis E are only partially understood. It is known that both viral factors (genotype and dose of inoculum) and host factors (presence of previous liver disease, pregnancy and distinct genetic polymorphisms) determine the course of infection. In most cases, hepatitis E causes self-limited illness, lasting from a few days to weeks, with an average of 4-6 weeks. However, in developed countries it can cause chronic disease with rapid progression to cirrhosis, especially in patients who are transplanted, have hematological malignancies requiring chemotherapy, or have infection with HIV. Hepatitis E is an underdiagnosed disease, partly due to the use of serological tests with low sensitivity. Diagnosis can be made indirectly by detecting antibodies against HEV in the serum, or directly by detecting the genome of the virus in blood or other body fluids. The tests for anti-hepatitis E antibody screening are commercially available, but none of them has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Unfortunately, the sensitivity and specificity of these tests vary greatly and this could explain the discrepancies in rates of anti-hepatitis E antibodies published for the various populations studied. The tests for viral RNA in serum and feces are confirmatory, but still experimental.

Hepatitis B Virus(HBV) infection is a common infectious disease affecting up to 2 billion people worldwide. Around 650 thousand people died of liver failure, cirrhosis and primary liver cancer caused by chronic hepatitis B every year. Age is the main factor affecting the chronicity of hepatitis B, while 90% and 25% to 30% of hepatitis b virus(HBV) infection in perinatal and infant period will develop into chronic infection respectively. Whereas the proportion in patients above 5 years old is only 5% to 10%. Intestinal microbiota plays an important role in maintaining nomal physiological function of the intestine and the immune function of the body. It has been found that the disorder of intestinal microbiota is associated with numerous intestinal and parenteral diseases. Recently, the relationship between immune response and intestinal microbiota has been claimed. In a previous study using IMT to treat HBeAg positive chronic hepatits B patients combined with antiviral theraopy, 80% of them has reached HBeAg clearance. Increasing evidence suggests that the gut microbiota has evolved as a new important player in the pathogenesis of hepatitis B virus-induced chronic liver disease. However, the composition and structure alteration of the gut microbiota associated with the stage and progression of HBV infection remains unknown. Hence, we proposed a trial to detected gut microbiota of chronic HBV infected patients high-throughput 16S rRNA gene sequencing to elucidate the microbial influence which contribute to the microbial shift of patient in different stage.

The purpose of this study is to learn how 12 weeks of HCV treatment with elbasvir and grazoprevir (brand name Zepatier) impacts your kidney function.

The " CirB-RNA " cohort aims to create a biological collection associated with clinical and biological data from patients with hepatitis B infection. This project is part of a much larger program that aims to characterize and quantify circulating viral RNAs as a possible new biomarker of hepatitis B functional cure.

The purpose of this study is to identify patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) who were lost of follow up and relinkage them to hepatitis C care