Prevalence of antibodies to human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8) in saudi arabian patients with and without renal failure

Background Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) is the most common cancer occurring in ren al transplant recipients in Saudi Arabia, where the reported incidence of p osttransplantation KS is 10 times higher than the incidence in the United S tates and Western Europe, The reason for the particularly high incidence of posttransplantation KS in this geographic area is unknown, Methods. To explore the possibility that the high incidence of posttranspla ntation KS might be the result of widespread infection with human herpesvir us 8 (HHV-8), we determined the prevalence of antibodies to HHV-8 in 201 pa tients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and a comparison group of 358 in dividuals without renal disease who were similar in age, sex, and area of r esidence. Antibodies to lytic cycle antigens of HHV-8 were determined by in direct immunofluorescence and confirmed by immunoblots using tetradecanoyl phorbol ester acetate-induced BC-3 cell extracts and recombinant small vira l capsid antigen (ORF65), Results. Antibodies to HHV-8 were detected in serum samples from 14 (6.97%) of 201 ESRD patients and from 10 (3.88%) of 258 in the comparison group (P =0.14) HHV-8 seropositive individuals were on average 10 years older than s eronegative subjects (55.3 years vs. 46.9 years), Among HHV-8 seropositive subjects, 71% were male and 29% were female. Conclusions. Serologic evidence of HHV-8 infection was numerically more com mon in men and in patients with ERSD. However, among patients with and with out ERSD, the strongest association was with increasing age.