Decreased ratio of CD4/CD8 lymphocytes might be predictive for successful interferon alpha and lamivudine combined therapy in childhood chronic hepatitis B infection: A preliminary study

Advance in molecular mechanism of interferon to treat chronic hepatitis B

The antiviral efficacy of interferon-α (IFN-α) therapy for chronic hepatitis B (CHB) is not only related to DNA load and genetype of HBV before treatment, gene mutation of HBV and polymorphism of type II HLA in the host, but also depends on the immunity of CHB patients. Researchers pay more and more attention to the mutant strain of virus and phenotypes of genes. However, the mechanism of interferon to resist HBV and the escape mechanism of HBV against the IFN therapy have not been clarified yet. This paper reviews the mechanism of IFN therapy and the influencing factors at molecular and genetic levels.

T lymphocyte subsets determination and DNA ploidy analysis in the differential diagnosis between benign and malignant ascites

Differentiating malignant from benign ascites often leads to confusion and an inability to exclude its multitude of causes in many patients. In the present study, T lymphocyte subsets and DNA ploidy in ascitic fluid were detected by flow cytometer. There were significant differences in T lymphocyte subsets between benign and malignant ascites. For malignant ascites, the sensitivity of DNA aneuploid is 75.6%, the specificity is 79.0%, and the accuracy is 77.6%. The results demonstrate that T lymphocyte subsets determination and DNA ploidy analysis can be used in the differential diagnosis between benign and malignant ascites.