American Journal of Epidemiology Vol. 91, No. 5: 510-517
Copyright © 1970 by The Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health
research-article |
THE SERUM HEPATITIS RELATED ANTIGEN (SH) IN ILLICIT DRUG USERS1,2,3
4Reprint requests to Dr. Cherubin, Hospital Epidemiologist. Harlem Hospital Medical Center, 136 St. and Lenox Ave., New York, N. Y. 10037
Cherubin, C. E. (Harlem Hospital Medical Center, 136th St. and Lenox Ave., N.Y., N.Y. 10037), R. L Hargrove and A. M. Prince. The serum hepatitis related antigen (SH) in illicit drug users. Amer. J. Epid., 1970, 91: 510–517.—Sera taken from patients with hepatitis who denied drug usage, and from users of intravenous heroin and methamphetamine, with and without clinical evidence of hepatitis, were tested for the presence of the serum hepatitis related antigen (SH) by an Ouchterlony technique. Fifty-four % of in-patients with acute viral hepatitis who were known drug users had SH antigen in acute serum specimens. Two to three % of drug users without evidence of acute hepatitis also had detectable quantities of this antigen: By comparison, the frequency of antigen detection in volunteer blood donors was 0.1%. There was a correlation, in both acute hepatitis cases and in asymptomatic drug users, between the degree of serum glutamic pyruvic transaminase elevation and the presence of detectable SH antigen. Fifty % of sera from adolescents and young adults with hepatitis, at Harlem Hospital and New York Hospital, who denied drug usage were also positive for SH antigen. This suggests either that the addiction problem is far greater than previously surmised, or that other modes of transmission of SH antigen positive hepatitis exist in New York City. In any case it appears that the majority of adult cases of hepatitis occurring in this study were caused by this agent which may be specific for serum hepatitis.
drug addiction; hepatitis; infectious; homologous serum
1From Columbia University School of Public Health and Administrative Medicine, the Harlem Hospital Medical Center, The Departments of Medicine and Pathology, The New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, and the Laboratory of Virology. The New York Blood Center, New York, New York.
2These studies were supported by grant No. HE 09011 of the National Heart Institute. NIH, and a grant-in-aid by the Strasburger Foundation. A. M. Prince is the recipient of a Career Scientist Award of the HRC of the City of N. Y. under contract No. 1-533.
3The authors are most grateful to Jacqueline Brown, R.N., Dr. Vonderbush and the Medical Housp Staff of Harlem Hospital; Dr. Harold Trigg of the Morris J. Bernstein Institute and the laboratory personnel for their cooperation in obtaining serum samples on the admissions of the Institute; Miss Kathleen Burke and Mrs. Nancy Lohse who supervised the laboratory work.