QUANTITATION OF HEPATITIS-C VIRUS IN LIVER AND PERIPHERAL-BLOOD MONONUCLEAR-CELLS FROM PATIENTS WITH CHRONIC HEPATITIS-C VIRUS-INFECTION

Since the natural history of hepatitis C virus-associated liver diseas e and the therapeutic responsiveness might vary according to liver and blood mononuclear cells viral levels, it may be important to quantita te viral RNA in liver, blood mononuclear cells and serum, and to compa re these data with genotype, biochemical and histologic data. A polyme rase chain reaction-based assay available for serum hepatitis C virus RNA quantitation has been optimized to quantitate viral genomes in liv er and peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 47 chronic hepatitis C patients. The procedure permitted hepatitis C virus RNA quantitation i n freshly isolated mononuclear cells and in total RNA extracted from f rozen mononuclear cells and liver tissue. The intrahepatic viral amoun t (median: 2.6 x 10(3) copies/mu g RNA; range: 0 to 3.6 x 10(4) copies /mu g RNA) correlated significantly with the hepatitis C virus RNA con centration in serum (r = 0.76, P<.001) but not in mononuclear cells. V iral RNA concentrations in liver (P<.001), serum (P<0.01) and PBMC (P < 0.05) were significantly higher in hepatitis C virus genotype 1 pati ents (essentially type Ib) than in non-1 type cases, but were unrelate d to biochemical or histologic indexes of disease activity. In conclus ion, the optimized assay permit HCV RNA quantitation in liver and peri pheral blood mononuclear cells, suggesting that serum viral level is a n accurate measurement of intrahepatic viral burden. (C) 1998 Wiley-Li ss, Inc.