Prevalence of autoantibodies and the risk of autoimmune thyroid disease in children with chronic hepatitis C virus infection treated with interferon-α

Table 1 Epidemiological, clinical, and biochemical baseline data for HCV-infected patients who underwent either IFN-α monotherapy or combined therapy with IFN-α or peginterferon-α plus ribavirin

	IFN-α(n = 21)	IFN-α +ribavirin(n = 40)	Peginterferon-α+ ribavirin(n = 62)
Male/female ( n )	12/9	19/21	29/33
Median age, yr (range)	9.5 (2-17)	8.1 (2-16)	10.6 (2-17)
Route of infection, n (%)
Parenteral	12 (57%)	14 (35%)	28 (45.1%)
Vertical	9 (43%)	21 (52.5%)	25 (40.3%)
Unknown	-	5 (12.5%)	9 (14.6%)
Median time between diagnosis and treatment, yr (range)	2.8 (1-9)	2.5 (1-5)	Not determined
Response to treatment, n (%)
Sustained	6 (29%)	24 (60%)	36 (59%)
Transient	3 (14%)	1 (2.5%)	7 (11%)
No response	12 (57%)	15 (37.5%)	19 (30%)
Median ALT level ( U/L ) (range)
Before treatment	39 (13-386)	35.5 (7-90)	41.6 (11-293)
After treatment (24 mo)	35 (9-137)	22.1 (6-104)	23.1 (7-71)