Evaluation of the pol/S Gene Overlapping Mutations in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients in Northern Cyprus.

Evaluation of the pol/S Gene Overlapping Mutations in Chronic Hepatitis B Patients in Northern Cyprus. Pol J Microbiol. 2019 Sep;68(3):317-322 Authors: Arikan A, Sayan M, Sanlidag T, Suer K, Akcali S, Guvenir M Abstract Mutations associated with the pol and the S gene can emerge as a consequence of the high replication capacity and proofreading deficiencies of hepatitis B virus during replication. The current study was constructed to evaluate primary, partial, compensatory and the escape mutations in chronic hepatitis B patients in Northern Cyprus. The samples of HBsAg positive treatment naïve 100 patients were involved in this study. HBV pol gene region was sequenced, amplified and HBV pol/S gene mutations were determined. The samples of thirty-two patients were excluded because of their low viral load (HBV < 1000 ıu/ml). Among the sequenced 68 samples, there was a partial mutation (1.5%) and 36.7% displayed a resistance profile to lamivudine, adevofir, and telbivudine. Immune response escape, vaccine escape, HBIg and diagnosis escape mutations were determined in 24%, 10%, 6%, and 4% samples of the patients, respectively. Additionally, there were six different combined mutations. These data underscored that there is no concern for primary mutations in Northern Cyprus, however, we have identified a compensatory mutation (rtV173M) that may have primary mutation characteristics by combining with other mutation patterns. Additional...
Source: Polish Journal of Microbiology - Category: Microbiology Tags: Pol J Microbiol Source Type: research