Impact of HBV, HCV and GBV-C/HGV on hepatocellular carcinomas in Europe

Clinical and histological impact of previous hepatitis B virus infection in patients with chronic hepatitis C

“…Occult HBV infection is defined by the presence of HBV DNA by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in serum or liver tissue samples from HBV‐negative individuals (8). Recent reports suggest that HCV carriers who also harbour this silent infection have more advanced liver fibrosis (9, 10), reduced response to interferon (11, 12) and increased risk of developing hepatocellular carcinoma (13, 14). Similar findings have been described among chronic hepatitis C patients with serological markers of prior HBV infection [anti‐hepatitis B core antigen (anti‐HBc) positive, with or without anti‐hepatitis B surface antigen (anti‐HBs)], irrespective of HBV‐DNA detection (11, 15–17).…”

Occult hepatitis B virus infection in patients with autoimmune liver diseases

“…To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the prevalence of occult HBV infection in patients with autoimmune hepatic diseases. So far, extensive studies on this issue have been carried out only in patients with cryptogenic chronic liver disease (47–49), hepatocellular carcinoma (31, 50–52) and chronic hepatitis C (11–30). Although the precise prevalence of this clinical entity remains very difficult to be defined, it is rather clear that the frequency of occult HBV infection is significantly increased in patients with chronic HCV‐related liver disease compared with those with nonviral liver diseases (11, 14, 24) and, furthermore, is significantly associated with the development of hepatocellular carcinoma in this group of HCV patients (31, 53, 54).…”