A possible relationship to treatment between hepatitis-associated antigen and chronic persistent hepatitis in Hodgkin's disease.
Hepatitis-associated (Australia) antigen (HAA) was detected in the sera of 16 (50%) of 33 patients with Hodgkin's disease; all of these patients had received the same treatment for approximately two years, and they had been in complete remission for at least two years. The HAA-positive patients had significantly higher levels of serum SGPT and significantly lower bromsulphalein clearance than the HAA-negative patients. Histological changes compatible with a diagnosis of chronic persistent hepatitis were found in the livers of 12 of the 16 HAA-positive patients and in five of the 17 HAA-negative patients (p < 0.05). In 128 patients with Hodgkin's disease who had received various forms of treatment and who were studied at various stages of remission, HAA was found in the sera of 42 (33%). Tests for HAA repeated four months later in positive reactors of both groups showed persisting antigenaemia. Hepatitis-associated antigen was not present in the sera of any of 36 patients with Hodgkin's disease studied when the diagnosis was first made and before treatment had begun. These observations suggest that persistence of HAA and the presence of chronic persistent hepatitis were more likely to be related to the treatment the patients had received than to the disease itself.