الفهرس 
ClassificationOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
 |  | from | 108 |  |  |
| | | from | 108 | | |
Abstract
Egypt has the highest prevalence of HCV worldwide, where it infects about 15% of the general population. The combination of pegylated interferon alfa plus ribavirin is currently the standard therapy for chronic hepatitis C infection in adults.In this study Random out patients from the center of cardiac and digestive system, Sohag, Egypt, aged from 20 to 55 years old, between 2007 2009, negative for HBs antigens and HBs antibodies were screened for anti HCV antibodies. Ninety-two positive samples were confirmed by RT-PCR for HCV. The confirmed patients were received 12 vials of pegylated IFN alpha- 2a (180 IU/ml weekly) plus ribavirin (1000 mg for ≤ 75 Kg or 1200 mg for 75Kg) and follow up by RT-PCR. After the 12th week of treatment, Sixtyseven patients (72.8%) were complete early virological responded (complete-EVR) to the treatment (group A), and Twenty-five patients (27.2%) were nonresponded to the treatment (group BThe two groups were Screened for Serum alanine transaminase (ALT),
Serum aspartate transaminase (AST), Serum alpha fetoprotein (AFP), serum
Albumin, serum creatinine, Serum TSH, Hemoglobin (Hb), White blood cells count
(WBCs) and Platelets count. Leucopenia and other hematological disorders are
common side effects of this antiviral treatment. Statistically the two groups of
patients were similar with respect to clinical characteristics except Creatinine
(P=0.044*) and age (P=0.03*).
Three random HCV samples from group B were studied for the
diversity and sequence variations. These samples were Sohag-Akhmeem,
Sohag-Monshaa and Sohag-Maragha. Sequencing of 223 nucleotides of 5′-
UTR from PCR product was performed. Seven nucleotide variations were
found between sohag samples at positions 74, 92, 112, 113, 133, 172, and
180. One nucleotide insertion was detected in Sohag-Maragha at position
68
Summary
212. In multi-alignment analysis, the three sequences and 80 sequences of
HCV different genotypes from GenBank were used. Different variations at
different positions in 5′-UTR of HCV were observed.
According to the phylogenetic tree, the three samples (Sohag-
Akhmeem, Sohag-Monshaa and Sohag-Maragha) classified as genotype 4.
When Sohag-Monshaa compared with Sohag-Maragha and Sohag-
Akhmeem, the similarity was 96.9 and 97.8% respectively. Sohag-Akhmeem
and Sohag-Maragha were closely related (98.2%), while Sohag-Monshaa
clustered with L29619.1 isolate from Gabon, the similarity was 98.7%.
Multi-alignment of 5′UTR sequences of Sohag non-responded
samples with Egyptian responded ones from gene bank were done. One
nucleotide variation was found at position 153, nucleotide deletion was
detected in sohage isolates at position nine and two nucleotides insertion
was detected at positions 30 and 117.