Influenza vaccination with current inactivated vaccines homologous to the prevalent wild-type virus can reduce influenza illness in 75%-80% of healthy adults. Vaccine is recommended for all individuals with chronic underlying diseases and for those aged 65 years or older. Although influenza vaccination is still advocated for patients with blunted immunity, protection rates are not as high, runn...

BACKGROUND Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a significant clinical and financial burden for chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients. In Beijing, China, partial reimbursement on antiviral agents was first implemented for the treatment of CHB patients in July 1, 2011. AIMS In this study, we describe the medical cost and utilization rates of antiviral therapy for CHB patients to explore the impac...

Chronic HCV infections represent a major worldwide public health problem and are responsible for a large proportion of liver related deaths, mostly because of HCV-associated hepatocellular carcinoma and cirrhosis. The treatment of HCV has undergone a rapid and spectacular revolution. In the past 5 years, the launch of direct acting antiviral drugs has seen sustained virological response rates r...

 Abstract Background: Investigators were suspicious of tyrosine-methionine-aspartate-aspartate (YMDD) mutations occurred only in patients who were treated by lamivudine. However, YMDD mutations of hepatitis B virus gene (HBV DNA) in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB) untreated with antiviral medicines was reported in some studies. The aim of this study was to evaluate YMDD mutations in Ira...

PURPOSE Recent advances in the diagnosis and treatment of influenza, such as rapid testing and neuraminidase inhibitor therapy, are available, but their place in clinical practice and their cost-effectiveness have not been determined. MATERIALS AND METHODS To estimate the cost-effectiveness of these newer interventions, we used a decision model that compared several influenza management strat...

Materials and methods We performed a study in the National Institute for Infectious Diseases “Prof. Dr. Matei Bals”, Bucharest, Romania, randomizing patients between two groups initially: therapy with lamivudine 100 mg/day vs. standard of care (no antiviral therapy) and subsequently between three groups: lamivudine, standard of care and entecavir 0.5 mg/day, when this new analogue became availa...

BACKGROUND Enterovirus 71 (EV71) infection can induce a series of syndromes including herpangina, viraemia, hand-foot-and-mouth disease and even death. Outbreaks of EV71 infection have been reported periodically over the world and have caused a great number of casualties and a high medical expenditure. Some interferons (IFNs) have been used for the treatment of viral infections for decades; how...