Studies on HBeAg/anti-HBe in HBsAg positive liver diseases and asymtomatic HBsAg carriers (AsC) Part 2:

Clinical significance of HBeAg/anti-HBe in HBsAg positive diseases

Abstract

Following the previous paper, we investigated in this paper the clinical implication of HBV associated antigen-antibody systems, especially HBeAg and corresponding antibody assayed by passive hemagglutination method, in HBsAg positive liver diseases.
Among the 7 cases with acute hepatitis type B, HBeAg was detected in 3 cases at an early stage, one of them showed the seroconversion to anti-HBe during the follow-up period. No difference could be found in clinical course and prognosis of acute hepatitis between cases positive or negative for HBeAg.
Out of 74 cases with HBsAg positive chronic liver diseases, we detected HBeAg in 14 cases and anti-HBe in other 15 cases. HBeAg positive cases had a tendency to show higher levels and more fluctuation of their serum transaminase than did anti-HBe positive cases during recent two years of follow-up.
In several cases with HBsAg positive chronic hepatitis, the titers of HBeAg and antiHBe were assayed seqentially by passive hemagglutination method and they were correlated with transaminase values, HBsAg titers and anti-HBc titers. HBeAg titer was found to fluctuate not necessarily in coincidence with the rise of serum transaminase levels. There were a few cases in whom HBeAg disappeared at the time of the elevation of serum transaminase levels. On the other hand, we observed a few cases with anti-HBe positive chronic hepatitis who showed multiple episodes of remarkable elevation of their serum transaminase.