Autologus dendritic cell vaccine for chronic hepatitis B carriers

StephenW

Vaccine. 2010 Jan 28. [Epub ahead of print]

Autologus dendritic cell vaccine for chronic hepatitis B carriers: A pilot,
open label, clinical trial in human volunteers.

Luo J, Li J, Chen RL, Nie L, Huang J, Liu ZW, Luo L, Yan XJ.

Institute of Genetic Diagnosis, Department of Pharmacogenomics, School of
Pharmacy, The Fourth Military Medical University, 169 Changle West Road, Xi'an
710032, Shaanxi, China; Taizhou Hepatopathy Centre, 1 Medical City of China
Avenue, Taizhou City 225300, Jiangsu, China.

Antigen-presenting autologous dendritic cells (ADCs), primed with antigen,
have been used in immunotherapy. We evaluated ADCs for treatment of chronic
hepatitis B (CHB). ADCs were administered to 380 CHB patients. Virological,
biochemical, and serological responses were evaluated in each patient over the
course of 48 weeks. Undetectable levels of HBV DNA were reported in 46.36% of
patients negative for the hepatitis B "e" antigen (HBeAg) and 3.13%
HBeAg-positive patients. Normalization of alanine aminotransferase levels
occurred in both HBeAg-positive (P=0.007) and HBeAg-negative (P=0.003)
patients. It appears that ADC vaccination effectively reconstructed the
immunity and elicited virological, serological, and biochemical improvements
in some patients with chronic HBV. No side effects were observed.

Copyright © 2010. Published by Elsevier Ltd.