Behairy E. Behairy
Background and Objective: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a major health problem worldwide.In children below 12 years, interferon (IFN)α-based therapies and ribavirin, still the standard of care therapy. We aimed to evaluate the dendritic cell (DC)s’ functions in chronically infected HCV patients and its correlation with the response to therapy. Patients and methods:This prospective study included 30 chronic hepatitis C (CHC) patients and 30 healthy age-matched and sex-matched controls. Thefirst group received combined pegylated interferon-α-2b (Peg-IFN-α2b)/ribavirin therapy for 48 weeks. A quantitative HCV-RNA PCR was performed for all patients before treatment and at 12, 24, 48, and 24 weeks after treatment. To clarify the functions of DCs, we induced maturation of peripheral DCs from blood samples of CHC patients and healthy controls using Resiquimod (R848). The functions of DCs were assessed by measurement of the levels of IFN-γand interlukin-10 (IL-10).
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