Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2007 Jan;46(1):160-70.
doi: 10.1016/j.jhep.2006.10.007. Epub 2006 Nov 7.

Occult hepatitis B virus infection

Giovanni Raimondo  1 , Teresa Pollicino, Irene Cacciola, Giovanni Squadrito
Affiliations
Review

Occult hepatitis B virus infection

Giovanni Raimondo et al. J Hepatol. 2007 Jan.

Abstract

The persistence of hepatitis B virus (HBV) genomes in HBV surface antigen (HBsAg) negative individuals is termed occult HBV infection. Occult HBV status is associated in some cases with mutant viruses undetectable by HBsAg assays, but more frequently it is due to a strong suppression of viral replication and gene expression. Occult HBV infection is an entity with world-wide diffusion, although the available data of prevalence in various categories of individuals are often contrasting because of the different sensitivity and specificity of the methods used for its detection in many studies. Occult HBV may impact in several different clinical contexts, including the transmission of the infection by blood transfusion or organ transplantation and its acute reactivation when an immunosuppressive status occurs. Moreover, much evidence suggests that it can favour the progression of liver fibrosis and above all the development of hepatocellular carcinoma.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

Substances

LinkOut - more resources

-