Meta-Analysis
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2018. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Sep 14, 2018; 24(34): 3927-3957
Published online Sep 14, 2018. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v24.i34.3927
Epidemiology of viral hepatitis in Somalia: Systematic review and meta-analysis study
Mohamed Abdulkadir Hassan-Kadle, Mugtaba Sulaiman Osman, Pavel Petrovich Ogurtsov
Mohamed Abdulkadir Hassan-Kadle, Pavel Petrovich Ogurtsov, Center For the study of the Liver, Department of Hospital Medicine, Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (RUDN University), Moscow 117198, Russia
Mohamed Abdulkadir Hassan-Kadle, Abrar Research and Training Center, Abrar University, Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Dufle Specialist Hospital, Mogadishu 25, Somalia
Mugtaba Sulaiman Osman, Department of Psychiatry, School of Medicine, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland RCSI, Beaumont Hospital, Dublin 9, Ireland
Author contributions: Hassan-Kadle MA acquired, collected, extracted, and interpreted the data, drafted and revised the article and made the final approval; Mugtaba SO designed the study, analysis and interpreted the data, drafted the article and made the final approval; Ogurtsov PP revised the article and made the final approval.
Supported by RUDN University Program 5-100.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors deny any conflict of interest.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: This systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted as PRISMA guidelines.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Mohamed Abdulkadir Hassan-Kadle, MBChB, MD, Doctor, Abrar Research and Training Center, Abrar University, Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Dufle Specialist Hospital, 25 Mogadishu, Somalia. dr.kadle@abrar.edu.so
Telephone: +252-6-15910409
Received: March 17, 2018
Peer-review started: March 17, 2018
First decision: April 11, 2018
Revised: May 25, 2018
Accepted: June 21, 2018
Article in press: June 21, 2018
Published online: September 14, 2018
ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS
Research background

Viral hepatitis is a major public health problem affecting several hundred million people globally. The most common types of viral hepatitis are six distinct types (hepatitis A, B, C, D, E, G viruses), and they may present in acute form or chronic form causes substantial morbidity and mortality (including chronic hepatitis, cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma).

Research motivation

In the field of viral hepatitis, there is a lack of researches last three decades in country and all articles about viral hepatitis published and unpublished are scattered. In this systematic review and meta-analysis the authors aim to provide a clear understanding of viral hepatitis epidemiology and their clinical burdens in Somalia according to the related documents published and unpublished articles during the last decades.

Research objectives

The main objective of this study is to determine the prevalence of all viral hepatitis in Somalia especially hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV), and to inform public health practitioners, researchers and policy makers, and to be a baseline data for future Hepatology researches in the country.

Research methods

A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted as Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines. A comprehensive literature search of published studies on viral hepatitis was performed from 1977-2016 in PubMed, Google Scholar, Science Direct, World Health Organization African Index Medicus and the Africa Journals Online databases, as well as on the Ministry of Health website. We also captured unpublished articles that were not available on online systems.

Research results

Twenty-nine studies from Somalia and Somali immigrants (United Kingdom, United States, Italy, Libya) with a combined sample size for each type of viral hepatitis were analyzed. The overall pooled prevalence rate of hepatitis A virus was 90.2%. The overall pooled prevalence of HBV was 18.9%. The overall pooled prevalence of HCV was estimated as 4.84%. The overall pooled prevalence of hepatitis D virus was 28.99%. The overall pooled prevalence of hepatitis E virus was 46.86%.

Research conclusions

This study demonstrates a high prevalence of all forms of viral hepatitis in Somalia and it also indicates that chronic HBV was the commonest cause of chronic liver disease.

Research perspectives

Viral hepatitis in Somalia demonstrated a high rate in its all types of hepatitis especially hepatitis B virus and C, while hepatitis B determined the common cause of chronic liver disease in Somalia. According to this systematic review and meta-analysis, further studies are needed in order to search out data about viral hepatitis in different regions of the country, risk factors and its complications.