Hepatitis Weekly articles from October 2000

Hepatitis Weekly archives from October 2000

United Nations Agency Campaign "Resounding Success".
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- The U.N. health agency declared victory in the first phase of its anti-yellow fever campaign in Liberia. "The vaccination campaign is ending in Grand Cape Mount County and has been a resounding success,"...

CDC Releases U.S. Vaccine Coverage Statistics.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- According to a report in the September 22, 2000, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, immunization coverage in the U.S. was greater than or equal to 90% for three doses of poliovirus vaccine, three doses of...

Global Vaccine Fund To Assist 13 Developing Countries.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- The Global Fund for Children's Vaccines will give more than US$150 million worth of vaccines and funding over five years to improve immunization programs in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Thirteen...

Pretreatment with Corticosteroids and Thymic Extract Studied in HBV Patients.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- A new study reported by researchers in Poland suggests that immunocorrective pretreatment with corticosteroids and thymic extract enhances the immune mechanisms of chronic hepatitis B patients, thereby...

Type 1 Immune Disease is Marked by Antibodies for Soluble Liver Antigen.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- In trying to find out whether antibodies for soluble liver antigen would be a good indicator for autoimmune hepatitis type 3, medical investigators have discovered that those antibodies are a good indicator...

Doctors in Asia Share One Liver Between Hong Kong and Taiwan Donor Recipients.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- It remains no secret that organs for transplantation are hard come by and that patients sometimes remain on active donor lists for long periods of time. This situation exists on an international level. In...

Gemcitabine/Etoposide Therapy Causes Hepatic Dysfunction in HBV(+) Lung Cancer Patients.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Phase II clinical trials have shown that gemcitabine, when used in conjunction with etoposide for treating lung cancer patients, can cause some side effects, including hepatic dysfunction in patients who are...

Replication Mechanism is Distinctly Different in Genomic and Subgenomic RNA.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Contrary to conventional medical thought, RNA polymerase II (pol II) is not required for the synthesis of both hepatitis delta virus (HDV) genomic RNA and subgenomic mRNA. Study results that support this...

BioHep B Vaccine Raises Sufficient Immune Response in Infants and Children.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Scientific collaborators at two research institutions recently reported their results of the use of BioHep B vaccine on newborns and children at an immunology conference that was held in Poznan, Poland. ...

Twice-Daily Interferon Regimen Clears Viral RNA But Increases Toxic Effects.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Interferon therapy is a common method of treatment for patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV). However, some people respond better to interferon therapy than others based on their HCV subtype. Data from a...

Piggyback Transplant Technique Benefits Patients More than Standard Method.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- In a study comparing standard technique orthotopic liver transplantation with the piggyback technique, the latter was found to have several advantages. Researchers at the University of Kentucky report...

Newspaper Reports Questionable Involvement of Schering-Plough in Hepatitis C Coalitions.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- In what appears to be a bold marketing ploy, drugmaker Schering-Plough reportedly created a number of "grass-roots" hepatitis C coalitions in the U.S. for the purposes of selling its antiviral drug, Rebetron,...

Hepatitis C Infection More of an Issue Now that HIV(+) Patients are Living Longer.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- HIV patients coinfected with the hepatitis C virus are now having to deal with resultant liver disease that, prior to improved anti-HIV drugs, most wouldn't have lived long enough to experience. According...

Collaboration Will Develop PEGylated Natural Alpha Interferon to Treat Hepatitis C.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Valentis (VLTS), Burlingame, California, announced that its subsidiary, PolyMASC Pharmaceuticals plc, has signed an agreement to collaborate with Viragen, Inc. (VRA) to develop a treatment for hepatitis C. ...

Hepatitis A Virus Outbreak Worsening in Maryland.
October 2, 2000... 2000 OCT 2 - (NewsRx.com) -- Twenty-four people have been sickened in a hepatitis A outbreak linked to three southern Maryland restaurants, and the virus appears to be spreading, health officials said. To fight the highly contagious...

Improper Blood Port Cleaning Places Dialysis Patients at Risk for Hepatitis C.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Staffers in the Department of Pathology at Shands Jacksonville Medical Center in Florida report that despite recent emphasis on the importance of cleaning medical equipment that may have been in contact with...

Interferon Limits Expression of Growth Factor in Hepatitis B Patients.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- The likelihood that interferon (IFN)-alpha therapy can have a negative impact on growth hormone secretion has been confirmed by at least one study of pediatric patients. Results of a study conducted by...

Liver Cancer Patients in Austria Seek Care Too Late for Curative Therapy.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Liver cancer patients in Austria tend to wait too long before seeking treatment, an epidemiological study found. As a result, physicians had little to offer the patients in terms of treatment options, and...

Growth Factor No Enhancer of Hepatitis B Vaccine Efficacy in Renal Patients.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Granulocyte macrophage-colony stimulating factor does not increase the effectiveness of hepatitis B vaccinations in individuals who must undergo hemodialysis, scientists at the University of Rochester Medical...

Molecular Testing Identifies Patients Common to Hepatitis B Outbreak.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Researchers in Italy described in a recent edition of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology how they used molecular testing to identify the genetic characteristics of a hepatitis B virus (HBV) outbreak in a...

Swedish Patients with Chronic Hepatitis Benefit Cost-Wise from Dual Therapy.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Conference attendees at the 22(nd) Annual Meeting of the Society for Medical Decision Making were presented with a report by researchers from several institutions that supports combination therapy for chronic...

Infants Immunized Against Hepatitis B at Birth Receive Most Vaccine Doses.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- U.S. government researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that infants who receive their first dose of hepatitis B vaccine shortly after being born are more likely to receive...

Ribozyme Product Data Show Potent Antiviral Effects.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Ribozyme Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (RPI) (RZYM), Boulder, Colorado, presented cell culture data at the 4th Shanghai International Symposium on Liver Cancer and Hepatitis (Hepa 2000), held in Shanghai, China,...

Phase II Irofulven Trial Begins in Liver Cancer Patients.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- MGI Pharma, Inc. (MOGN), Minneapolis, Minnesota, has initiated a Phase II liver cancer trial with its anti-cancer compound, irofulven, to evaluate the safety and efficacy of irofulven in those patients. ...

Hepatitis B DNA Quantification Panel Release Announced.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- AcroMetrix Corp., Berkeley, California, announced the release of their hepatitis B virus (HBV) nucleic acid panel for use in blood screening and medical diagnostic laboratories worldwide. As with their...

Asia Pacific Guidelines Endorse Zeffix as a Key Treatment Option for Hepatitis B.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- BioChem Pharma Inc. (BCHE; BCH) announced that new guidelines drawn up by the Asia Pacific Consensus Group on the Prevention and Management of Chronic Hepatitis B and C, in association with the Journal of...

Drug Target Discovered for Hepatitis B.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Myriad Genetics, Inc. (MYGN), Salt Lake City, Utah, announced that it has discovered a drug target for the treatment of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. The target was discovered using Myriad's ProNet...

Immortomouse Hepatocytes Useful for Hepatic Gene Therapy Model.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Hepatocytes from the transgenic "immortomouse" survive in vivo transfer to the liver and should be a useful model for hepatic gene therapy, say researchers in Australia. "The use of hepatocytes for gene...

TT Virus Infections Highly Prevalent in Transfused Pediatric Patients.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Pediatric patients in Japan who receive blood transfusions due to malignancies or other disorders requiring transfusions stand a relatively high risk for acquiring TT virus infection, according to a study in...

Editorial Says International Research Often Unethical and Irrelevant.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- International research is often unethical and irrelevant to the needs of developing countries, argues Prof. Solomon Benatar of the University of Cape Town's Bioethics Centre. And it fails to address the huge...

Isoniazid Therapy for TB Causes Liver Problems in Transplant Patients.
October 16, 2000... 2000 OCT 16 - (NewsRx.com) -- Isoniazid therapy could cause potential problems in the same people it is meant to protect. A study conducted by researchers in Spain shows that prophylactic isoniazid (INH) therapy, when administered to...

Pituitary Condition Should be Considered for Unexplained Infant Hepatitis.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Physicians should check the pituitary status of infants who have unexplained hepatitis, according to a study in Acta Paediatrica. A delay in making such a diagnosis could have a long-term impact on the...

Needle-Exchange Program Follow-up Shows Some Risky Practices Continue Unabated.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- A follow-up study of a major Seattle, Washington, needle exchange program reports that needle exchange significantly correlates with not re-using a used needle to inject drugs, but does not necessarily limit...

Longer Therapy Better for Patients Who Suffer Hepatitis C Relapse.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Longer durations of combination therapy can successfully treat hepatitis C virus (HCV) patients who relapse after an initial round of treatment with interferon, especially if they initially have high levels...

Helicobacter hepaticus Not a Factor for Disease in IL-10 Deficient Mice.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Mice lacking the gene for expressing interleukin (IL)-10 are not highly susceptible to Helicobacter hepaticus infection, nor do they experience any greater degree of colitis or other associated symptoms of...

Research Analyzes Hepatitis C Prevalence in Mexican Children with Hemophilia.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Researchers in Mexico studying the prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in hemophiliac children in Mexico suggest that a majority of children acquired their infections during the 1980s and 1990s....

Hepatic Veno-occlusive Disease Prevalent in Children Taking Senecio Extract.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Populations indigenous to Europe, Africa, Asia, South America, and North America have used plant extracts as remedies for diseases since time began. However, some of those herbal medications can cause serious...

Scientists Discover Autoimmune Response in Germander-Related Cytolytic Hepatitis.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- A follow-up of patients in France who developed cytolytic hepatitis as a result of ingesting germander, an herbal medicine said to cause weight loss, showed that in many cases, the patient's immune response...

Th-1 and Hepatitis are Key for Impaired Response in Hemodialysis Patients.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- A study in a recent edition of the journal Cytokine reported that hemodialysis patients have reduced production of certain cytokines and that the presence of hepatitis C virus influences the way in which those...

Radiofrequency Ablation Therapy Confirmed Effective.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Mayo Clinic investigators recently described the successes they had achieved by treating patients with liver cancer using a new therapy called radiofrequency ablation (see Cancer Weekly, September 11, 2000)....

Entecavir Therapy Shows Potent Activity against Hepatitis B Virus.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Representatives from an international consortium of medical investigators recently announced the promising results achieved by treating hepatitis B virus (HBV) patients with the new drug entecavir. Their...

Second Course of Interferon Increases Response Rate in Hepatitis C Relapsers.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Hepatitis C virus (HCV) relapsers could potentially be helped by taking a second dose of interferon therapy, according to medical investigators in Japan. These gastroenterologists say that HCV RNA, which...

Study in Turkey Suggests Hepatitis A and Helicobacter Similarly Transmitted.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- A sero-epidemiological investigation of children in Instanbul, Turkey, suggests that Helicobacter pylori shares the same mode of fecal-oral transmission as the more prevalent hepatitis A virus. ...

Transforming Growth Factor-alpha Associates with Hepatocytes in Liver Cancers.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- More new evidence that transforming growth factor (TGF)-alpha is significantly expressed in the livers of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been found by researchers at the Asan Medical Center...

Novel Adjuvant Boosts Hepatitis B Vaccine Response in Adolescents.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- New evidence points to the ability of a novel adjuvant called SBAS4 to increase the effectiveness of the hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccine in adolescents. In fact, this novel adjuvant-containing vaccine...

Hepatitis Hits Orphanage in Siberia.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Twenty-seven children have been hospitalized with hepatitis in Siberia after an outbreak swept through an overcrowded orphanage, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported September 29, 2000. According to the...

Hepatitis Vaccination, Drug Treatment Recommended for Hemophiliacs.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Hemophilia patients are highly susceptible to infection with hepatitis viruses and therefore physicians recommend available immunization and drug therapy, as appropriate, for this population. Leonard B....

More Patients Presenting with Lamivudine-Resistant Hepatitis B.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- According to a research report published in the Journal of Hepatology, medical personnel who take care of patients with hepatitis B virus (HBV) are beginning to see more and more patients with viral strains...

Adoptive Immunotherapy Lowers Risk of Postsurgical Recurrence.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Adoptive immunotherapy can reduce postsurgical recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), say researchers in Japan. "Postsurgical recurrence of HCC is frequent and fatal," stated T. Takayama and...

Viral Persistence Critical for CNS Retention of CD8(+) Cells in Animal Model.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- CD8(+) T cells remain in the spinal cord and central nervous system (CNS) structures for an extended period of time after a bout of encephalomyelitis, scientists report. However, these cells only remain in...

High-Dose Interferon Alfacon-1 Safely Fights Hepatitis C Infection.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- Administration of high-dose interferon alfacon-1 (Infergen, Amgen) appears to eliminate hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections in most infected patients without increasing their risk of serious side effects,...

Study Shows Speed of Liver Regeneration After Transplant.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- The development of adult living donor liver transplantation (LDLTx) about two years ago vastly increases the pool of potential donors for patients in need of healthy livers. The surgery offers new hope to...

CDC Researchers See No Association Between Hep B and Hib Vaccines and Diabetes.
October 30, 2000... 2000 OCT 30 - (NewsRx.com) -- United States government researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, can find no evidence that hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccine and the Haemophilus influenzae type b...