[Relationship between liver pathology and clinical characters in HBV carriers].

Objectives: To study the relationship between liver pathology and clinical characters of chronic HBV carriers.

Methods: Analyze the age, sex, grade of liver inflammation and stage of liver fibrosis among patients with chronic HBV carriers (n = 58) and non-active HBsAg carriers (n = 32), and compare the grade of liver inflammation and stage of liver fibrosis in different groups according to age, ALT levels and with/without HBeAg. The data was processed by using t test or Chi-square test for statistical analysis, respectively.

Results: (1) No differences existed in gender composition ratio between chronic HBV carriers and non-active HBsAg carriers. However, the ages of non-active HBsAg carriers group (35.2+/-7.6) were much older than that of the HBV carriers group (24.7+/-4.8) (t = 2.576, P = 0.017). (2) The stage of liver fibrosis in non-active HBsAg carriers group was more aggravated than that of the chronic HBV carriers group (Chi-square = 23.231, P less than 0.01), whereas no significant differences existed between these 2 groups (Chi-square = 0.058, P = 0.972). (3) As to the grade of liver inflammation and the stage of liver fibrosis, significant differences existed between the groups with higher level of serum ALT (20-40 U/L) and lower level ( is less than or equal to 20 U/L) (Chi-square = 7.827, P = 0.008; Chi-square = 14.303, P = 0.001), and similar results also existed between elder group (more than 40) and younger group (is less than or equal to 40) (Chi-square = 10.949, P = 0.001; Chi-square = 21.271, P less than 0.01); (4) Among the chronic HBV carriers, significant differences existed in grade of liver inflammation between groups with HBeAg positive and negative patients (Chi-square = 10.275, P = 0.002), and the latter was more aggravated; however, there was no difference in stage of liver fibrosis between them (Chi-square test = 3.457, P = 0.178).

Conclusion: Liver histopathology can be recommended to guide the clinical diagnosis and treatment, especially for the chronic HBV carriers, with elder age, ALT close to normal and HBeAg negative.