الفهرس 
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Abstract
The aim of the work is to evaluate the effect of antiviral therapy, IFN alpha 2b on patients of chronic HCV infection i.e. the biochemical response (normalization of ALT) and the Virological response (conversion of PCR from positive to negative).
We conclude that:
The results of our clinical study promote some considerations. First of all, IFN is effective in patients with chronic HCV infection, as far as serum ALT response is considered.
Fatigue and arthralgia, by far, were the most common complaints among patients of chronic HCV infection.
About one third of our cases had more than one risk factor and about one fifth had no risk factors of HCV acquisition. Side effects of the drug were minimum and tolerable.
No relation was found between pre treatment ALT levels and the severity of liver damage. There was a lack of association between levels of viremia and histological findings.
IFN therapy causes decline in serum ALT levels significantly, which reflects regression in underlying liver damage, as evidenced by histological evaluation in many studies.
Non-responders had significantly higher weight than responders.
The earlier the normalization of ALT, the higher the possibility of sustained response to treatment with a significant difference. Patients with HCV genotype II showed more significant biochemical and Virological response than those with genotype IV. Also, a significant relation was found between the level of viremia and the response of the therapy.
The data from this study permit prediction of good or non response to IFN, according to the specific pretreatment profile of individual patients.