Low frequency of HLA-DRBI*11 in hepatitis C virus induced end stage liver disease

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection becomes chronic in more than 70% of patie nts, leading to endstage liver disease in about 20-30% of these patients. A part from the virus itself,host factors that modulate the immune response a re likely to be involved in determining the outcome of HCV infection. Studi es on the association of human leucocyte antigens (HLAs) and HCV infection have shown inconsistent results. Selection of patient subgroups may be cruc ial. However, any association relevant to HCV disease progression will beco me evident, especially in those patients with end stage liver disease. Ther efore, we analysed the phenotype frequencies of HLA antigens in two groups of 69 and 39 patients with HCV induced liver cirrhosis who had received a t ransplant or were awaiting liver transplantation, The first group was typed serologically and compared with 331 blood and Liver donors. The second; gr oup, prospectively HLA typed by a polymerase chain reaction-sequence specif ic oligonucleotide (PCR-SSO) procedure for HLA-DRB and DQB alleles, was com pared with another 170 PCR-SSO typed and randomly selected blood donors. De creased frequencies for HLA-DR5 and HLA-DQ3 were found in one group of pati ents with HCV induced liver cirrhosis compared with the control groups. In the second analysis comparing 39 patients with end stage liver cirrhosis wi th blood donors, we confirmed the significant decrease in HLA-DRB1*11 and H LA-DQB1*03, which corresponded to serological HLA-DR5 and HLA-DQ3 antigens, respectively. Our results show that the presence of HLA-DRB1*11 and HLA-DQ B1*03 alleles is associated with a reduced risk for the development of HCV induced end stage liver disease.