Bioinformatic Analysis of Hepatitis C Virus Internal Ribosomal Entry Site Secondary Structure Related To Response to Interferon Combined Therapy in Egyptian Patients

doi:10.21608/arjb.2019.428808

Bioinformatic Analysis of Hepatitis C Virus Internal Ribosomal Entry Site Secondary Structure Related To Response to Interferon Combined Therapy in Egyptian Patients

Document Type : Original Article

10.21608/arjb.2019.428808

Abstract

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is the major cause of chronic hepatitis. The HCV
genotype 4a is predominant in Egyptian patients that are not responding to the combined pegylated
interferon-alpha /ribavirin therapy. The HCV IRES is a well-defined structure of about 341
nucleotides in its 5´-untranslated region (UTR). This study conducted on 46 Quantification of
HCV-RNA in serum has been carried out at the beginning of treatment (W0) and at week12 (W12),
patients 26 responders and 20 non-responders to study HCV IRES sequence and secondary
structure for genotype 4a and find the correlation to paginated interferon\ribavirin Responding
Treatment in Egyptian patients. There was no statistically significant difference between responders
and non-responders regarding gender (P=0.1), age (P=0.3), AFP (P=0.4) and Albumin (P=0.1)
while There was a significant increase for AST/ALT (P=0.002, P=0.001), respectively. HCV IRES
RT-PCR and sequence analysis including genotyping, MSA and Sequence variation showed that
98% genotype 4a and there was no significant difference in sequence between responders and non
responders patients in addition to the prediction of HCV IRES secondary structure MFE. Centroid
revealed that there was no effect on IRES secondary structure and it is conserved among all HCV
genotypes.

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