Circulating Pregenomic Hepatitis B Virus RNA Is Primarily Full-length in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients Undergoing Nucleos(t)ide Analogue Therapy

Mark Anderson; Jeffery Gersch; Ka-Cheung Luk; George Dawson; Ivana Carey; Kosh Agarwal; Pir Shah; Geoffrey Dusheiko; Daryl Lau; Gavin Cloherty

doi:10.1093/cid/ciaa1015

Circulating Pregenomic Hepatitis B Virus RNA Is Primarily Full-length in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients Undergoing Nucleos(t)ide Analogue Therapy

Clin Infect Dis. 2021 Jun 1;72(11):2029-2031. doi: 10.1093/cid/ciaa1015.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Abbott Laboratories, Infectious Disease Core Diagnostics Department, Abbott Diagnostics Division, Abbott Park, Illinois, USA.
² King's College, Department of Infectious Diseases, London, United Kingdom.
³ Institute of Liver Studies, King's College Hospital, London, United Kingdom.
⁴ Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

PMID: 32687164
DOI: 10.1093/cid/ciaa1015

Abstract

Hepatitis B virus RNA is detectable in the serum of infected patients; however, the RNA species has been questioned. We tested 1827 specimens using a quantitative dual-target quantitative polymerase chain reaction assay and determined that full-length pregenomic RNA is the primary source. These results clarify the major identity of circulating HBV RNA species.

Keywords: hepatitis B virus; pregenomic RNA; quantitative polymerase chain reaction; viral diagnostic assay.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Antiviral Agents / therapeutic use
Cell-Free Nucleic Acids*
DNA, Viral
Hepatitis B virus / genetics
Hepatitis B* / drug therapy
Hepatitis B, Chronic* / drug therapy
Humans
RNA / therapeutic use

Substances

Antiviral Agents
Cell-Free Nucleic Acids
DNA, Viral
RNA