Survey of hepatitis B status in hemodialysis patients in a training hospital in Urmia, Iran

Abstract EN

To evaluate the prevalence of HBV infection in chronic hemodialysis patients at our dialysis center of Urmia's Taleqni Hospital, Urmia, Iran, we studied crosssectionally the hepatitis surface antigen (HbsAg) status in blood samples of 167 active chronic hemodialysis patients at our center with enzyme linked immunosorbant assay (ELISA).

The mean frequency of HbsAg + was 6.58%, which was higher in patients less than 50 years old than in those above 50 years (9.3% vs.

5.3%, respectively), in males than females (10.5% vs.

2.5%, respectively), and in those on three times dialysis than twice per week (7.1% vs.

0.0%, respectively).

We did not find a significant relationship between the factors of: age, sex, being resident in city or village, duration of the therapy, history of blood transfusion, marital status, job status, history of kidney transplantation, and prevalence of HbsAg +.