Abstract:

[Abstract] Objective To investigate the relationships between parameters of serum iron metabolism and liver in? flammatory activity grades, and to find out the difference in parameters of serum iron metabolism between patients with hepa? titis B and patients with hepatitis C. Methods A total of166patients with viral hepatitis were enrolled in this study, in? cluding135case of hepatitis B and31cases of hepatitis C. The serum iron metabolism indexes including serum iron (SI), se? rum ferritin (SF), transferring (TRF), total iron binding capacity (TIBC) were collected, and the transferring saturation (TS), al? anine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), total bilirubin (TBIL) and albumin (ALB) were calculated. Thirty-nine patients were selected from135hepatitis B patients by corresponding gender, age and liver function with31hep? atitis C patients. The indicators of iron metabolism were compared between two groups.Results There was a positive corre? lation between age , TRF and TIBC. There were positive correlations between SI, SF, TS and ALT, AST, TBIL respectively, and negative correlations between SF, TS and ALB. TRF and TIBC were negatively correlated with ALT, AST and TBIL, but positively correlated with ALB (rs=0.551，P＜0.001). The value of SF was significantly higher in patients with hepatitis C than that of patients with hepatitis B. The levels of TRF and TIBC were significantly lower in patients with hepatitis C than those of patients with hepatitis B (P＜0.05). There were no significant differences in SI and TS between two groups. Conclu? sion There was a significant correlation between parameters of serum iron metabolism and live inflammatory activity grades. The iron overload phenomenon is much common in patients with chronic hepatitis C than that of patients with chronic hepatitis B.

Key words: viral hepatitis, iron metabolism, liver inflammatory activity, chronic hepatitis C