Chronic viral hepatitis affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide, and each year millions more people become infected. In Chronic Viral Hepatitis, Second Edition, a panel of distinguished clinicians and clinical investigators build upon the first edition by comprehensively reviewing all the relevant new information regarding resistance, side effects, and therapies for chronic viral hepatitis. The text covers recent advances in the understanding of pathogenesis of viral hepatitis while discussing promising agents in development for its treatment. The authors devote special attention to reactivation of hepatitis B with chemotherapy and immunosuppression, herbal and non-traditional therapies, chronic viral hepatitis in the pediatric population, and immunology and immunotherapy of HCV and provide relative costs for all diagnostic and therapeutic options. Authoritative and up-to-date, Chronic Viral Hepatitis, Second Edition offers today's gastroenterologists, internists, hepatologists, and infectious disease specialists a practical guide to the recognition, diagnosis and treatment of chronic viral hepatitis from a multidisciplinary approach.

"The silent killer." That's how a headline in USA TODAY, the Nation's No. 1 Newspaper, described hepatitis. This life-threatening liver disease can go undetected for decades because it often causes no symptoms until serious liver damage has occurred. The good news is that new medications and research bring "hope, treatment, even cures." Millions of people around the world are diagnosed each year with viral hepatitis. In this book, you'll read case studies of people with various types of viral hepatitis and learn about the effects of this highly contagious yet preventable disease. You'll also find basic information about symptoms, transmission, prevention, and treatment to help you understand how to protect yourself, your friends, and your family from this serious disease.

Today, researchers are making major advances in treating hepatitis, although prevention and vaccination are currently the best ways to avoid the serious health effects of this disease.

This book aims to bridge the widening rift between clinical and molecular aspects of viral hepatitis by providing an up-to-date overview of the field. The focus is practical and covers the limitations of clinical diagnosis, the interpretation of tests bas

This book presents current recommendations for vaccination for pre- and post-exposure prophylaxis in all suitable target populations and groups. It provides immunization guidelines from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for health care workers and others at occupational risk of exposure and for routine vaccinations by the Immune Practices Advisory Committee of the Centers for Disease Control.;Covering all aspects of the production, testing and applications of Hepatitis B vaccines, this book: lists all available vaccines worldwide; discusses all serological assays in the field; examines how the vaccine was tested in international clinical trials; describes new programmes for universal immunization of infants; and reveals how the vaccine may prevent some forms of hepatocellular carcinoma.;The book should be of interest to: infectious disease specialists, clinical virologists, immunologists, haematologists, oncologists, hepatologists and gastroenterologists, paediatricians, pharmacologists, molecular biologists, biochemists, biotechnologists, genetic engineers, occupational safety administrators and public health specialists; and upper level undergraduate, graduate and medical school students of these disciplines.

Acute and chronic hepatitis and hepatitis-related diseases such as liver failure, liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma are among the most important causes for disabilities and death. Hepatocellular injury is due to a variety of agents including viruses, toxins, radiation, injury and drugs but also bacteria, parasites and autoimmune reactions. This volume reviews today’s knowledge about hepatitis with emphasis on comparative aspects between hepatitis in humans and animals, but also between different etiological agents. This particular viewpoint makes the book relevant for scientists from both human and veterinary medicine, gastroenterologists, pathologists, virologists and students of human and veterinary medicine.

An introduction to hepatitis B including what it is, how it's diagnosed, and how it's treated.

Toby K. Eisenstein Symposium Committee Chairperson Temple University School of Medicine Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19140 This symposium is the thirteenth biennial clinical microbiology program sponsored by the Eastern Pennsylvania Branch of the American Society for Microbiology in cooperation with the Philadelphia area medical schools and the Bureau of Laboratories of the Pennsylvania Department of Health. This year a generous contribution from Merck, Sharp and Dohme has helped to make the program a reality. The subject matter for this symposium represents an attractive spectrum of medical, biological and molecular approaches to the practical solution of a public health prob1em--name1y, prevention of infection with the hepatitis B virus. The symposium may be unique in that it focuses on a product which was first marketed less than three months ago, but included in the program are presen tations on two new approaches to hepatitis B vaccine production which may replace the one which is newly unveiled. The rapidity of progress in our present era of biological research is indeed astonishing.

This important book comprises a narrative account of research on the hepatitis B virus (and related subjects) and selected reprints from the laboratory of Nobel laureate Baruch S Blumberg and his colleagues. The hepatitis B virus (HBV) is one of the ten most common deadly infectious diseases and is responsible for 1.1 million deaths a year worldwide.Research in his laboratory resulted in the discovery of HBV and the invention of the vaccine which protects one against it. The research began as an apparently esoteric study of human biochemical and immunologic variation. This required field-work in Africa, the Arctic, the Pacific, the Americas, and in many other locations and populations. The overall goal was to identify inherited biological differences which were related to differing responses to disease-causing agents. The virus was discovered using the blood of an infected person who had developed the antibody, to detect the virus present in another infected person who had become a carrier of the virus. Screening of blood donors led to the near-elimination of post-transfusion hepatitis B.There are now national HBV vaccination programs in more than 70 countries. During the past decade these programs have strikingly reduced the prevalence of HBV in many countries and there has been a significant drop in the incidence of cancer of the liver in the vaccinated cohorts. The HBV vaccination program is now, after smoking cessation, the most widely used cancer prevention program in the world.

The last forty years have witnessed the discovery of five human hepatitis viruses: hepatitis virus A, B, C, D, and E, and two related blood-borne viruses: GB virus C and TT virus. Viral Hepatitis provides a comprehensive overview of the latest developments and research studies in human viral hepatitis. Written by leading international scientists in the field, this book covers topics ranging from the history of these viruses to their molecular biology, diagnosis, epidemiology and control. It will be an invaluable reference source for hepatitis researchers, reference and diagnostic laboratories, clinicians, public health officers and graduate and medical students. Book jacket.