Case Report
Copyright ©2007 Baishideng Publishing Group Co., Limited. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Aug 14, 2007; 13(30): 4149-4151
Published online Aug 14, 2007. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v13.i30.4149
Clearance of hepatitis C virus after living-donor liver transplantation in spite of residual viremia on end date of interferon therapy before transplantation
Tatsuki Ichikawa, Kazuhiko Nakao, Keisuke Hamasaki, Takuya Honda, Hidetaka Shibata, Mana Akahoshi, Susumu Eguchi, Mitsuhisa Takatsuki, Takashi Kanematsu, Katsumi Eguchi
Tatsuki Ichikawa, Kazuhiko Nakao, Keisuke Hamasaki, Takuya Honda, Hidetaka Shibata, Mana Akahoshi, Katsumi Eguchi, The First Department of Internal Medicine, Graduate School of Biomedical Science, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki 852-8501, Japan
Susumu Eguchi, Mitsuhisa Takatsuki, Takashi Kanematsu, Department of Transplantation and Digestive Surgery, Graduate School of Biomedical Science, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki 852-8501, Japan
Author contributions: All authors contributed equally to the work.
Correspondence to: Tatsuki Ichikawa, MD, The First Department of Internal Medicine, Graduate School of Biomedical Science, Nagasaki University, 1-7-1 Sakamoto, Nagasaki 852-8501, Japan. ichikawa@net.nagasaki-u.ac.jp
Telephone: +81-95-8497260 Fax: +81-95-8497270
Received: April 14, 2007
Revised: May 3, 2007
Accepted: May 12, 2007
Published online: August 14, 2007
Abstract

Interferon (IFN) therapy is the only treatment strategy for hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection after liver transplantation (LT), but prophylactic and treatable IFN therapy after LT has been shown to be insufficient due to the adverse effects of IFN and rivabirin. In this paper, we describe the disappearance of HCV after LT without IFN therapy in the presence of residual viremia on the day of LT. We herein report our findings since this is considered an important case for the anti-HCV strategy of post LT. A 60-year old woman with LC and HCC was referred to Nagasaki University Hospital in August 2004. After she underwent LT on February 18, 2005, we injected peg-IFN-α-2a the 11th time at 18 wk and HCV-RNA was still positive in the serum at LT. The serum HCV-RNA was negative one month after operation and subsequently dissolved 15 mo after operation without IFN therapy. As a result, we speculate that if HCV-RNA is positive while HCV core antigen is negative before LT, then it may lead to clearance of HCV after LT. Therefore long acting peg-IFN-α-2a is thus considered a potentially effective agent for the treatment of HCV-related cirrhosis before LT.

Keywords: Pegylated interferon; Liver transplantation; Hepatitis C virus