SAT0709 Subclinical hepatitis c virus infection in egyptian patients with rheumatologic diseases: a multi-centre study

Background Egypt has the highest prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the world. In 2015, the prevalence of HCV RNA was found to be 7.0%.(1 The prevalence of HCV was studied in Rheumatoid arthritis in few studies(,2,3 but to our knowledge, no previous work studied it in other rheumatologic patients. Objectives This study aims at detecting the prevalence of subclinical HCV infection in different rheumatologic disease groups in Egypt. Methods Consecutive patients with different rheumatologic diseases from seven- geographically different- rheumatology departments were prospectively studied. None of the patients was known to have previous HCV infection. Patients’ serum samples were screened for the presence of anti-HCV antibodies. Patients with positive serology were further evaluated for the presence of HCV ribonucleic acid by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Results 1454 rheumatic patients (1242 (85.4%) women, 212 (14.5%) men) with mean age[SD] of 43.7 [12.7] years were included in this study. Both anti-HCV serology and HCV RNA were positive in 124 patients (8.5%). Positive PCR for HCV was significantly higher in the age group of 40 to Conclusions The detection of subclinical HCV infection in 8.5% of rheumatologic patients in Egypt with significant higher level in the middle age group, draws attention to the importance of screening for HCV in such population for early detection and intervention. Disclosure of Interest None declared