1982 Volume 23 Issue 11 Pages 1292-1298
Medical personnel are at risk of contracting hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. We measured annually HBsAg and anti-HBs in the employees of our hospital from 1975 to 1980 in order to estimate the frequency of natural HBV infection in medical personnel. The positivity of anti-HBs was the highest among laboratory technicians, followed by doctors, nurses and nurse aides, and the lowest in non-medical employees. The percentage of annual positive turn of anti-HBs was 2.6% in laboratory technicians, 2.0% in doctors, 1.4% in nurses and nurse aides, and 1.0% in others. None of them had clinical acute hepatitis and it was thought that most the positive turns were due to subclinical infection. However, during the six year period, three cases of acute hepatitis B occurred among medical staff. These results clearly indicated that the personnel who handle blood or come in close contact with patients are at high risk compared to non-medical staff, calling for more positive prophylactic measures.
