الفهرس 
IntroductionOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The present work aims to study the role of different genetic polymorphisms of MxA gene and OAS-1 gene in evaluating the efficacy of pegylated interferon and ribavirin therapy in HCV patients and to correlate different genetic polymorphisms with the susceptibility to chronic HCV infection, treatment response to PEG-IFN and ribavirin combination therapy and the progression of disease. This retrospective study was carried on 120 patients with proven chronic hepatitis C who received pegylated IFN plus ribavirin combined therapy and 40 healthy controls were enrolled in this study. Subjects were all Egyptians. RNA quantifications were performed before treatment. IFN treatment and clinical follow-ups were performed at Mansoura University Hospitals, Mansoura, Al-Dakahlya, Egypt.Blood samples were collected and DNA extraction was done. DNA products were subjected to PCR followed by restriction for detection of genetic polymorphism using restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) technique.The effect of different OAS-1 and MxA genotypes on the susceptibility to chronic HCV infection was studied. OAS-1GG and MxAGT genotypes appeared to be risk factors for protection against chronic HCV infection. On the other hand, OAS-1AA genotype and OAS-1A allele appeared to be risk factors for chronic infection with HCV. However, in multivariate analysis, applying variables that were significant in univariate analysis, only higher ALT, AST and OAS-1AG genotype were considered independent predictors for susceptibility to HCV infection. Also, the correlation of different OAS-1 and MxA genotypes and treatment response of chronic HCV patients were studied. OAS-1AA genotype appeared to be risk factor for NR. On the other hand, OAS-1AG, MxATT genotypes and MxA T allele appeared to be protective against NR. In multivariate analysis, applying those factors that were significant in univariate analysis, higher viral load and higher grade of fibrosis were independent bad prognostic factors for NR, while OAS-1 AG and MxA TT genotypes were independent good prognostic factors for protection against NR. These findings indicate that OAS-1 and MxA play a role in treatment response of HCV infection to interferon and their polymorphisms are a good predictor of treatment response.In the current study, OAS-1AA genotype was significantly associated with lower fibrosis and activity when compared to AG and GG genotypes. On the other hand, OAS-1GG genotype was significantly correlated with higher fibrosis. Moreover, OAS-1AG genotype was significantly correlated with higher activity. Additionally, A allele had significantly lower fibrosis and lower activity. No significant differences between MxA genotypes regarding fibrosis and activity were found.