Acute Hepatitis C Virus Infection in the Prison Population

丙型肝炎病毒（HCV）感染了数百万监禁个体的约20- 40 在美国虽然许多研究已经描述了慢性HCV的血清发病率， 然而，在HCV感染的研究中，没有一个专门针对急性HCV感染的问题。以来 监禁与新发静脉注射毒品有关，这些人将在 急性HCV感染的高风险。对高危人群的筛查将有助于了解 并允许表征其免疫功能 应答此外，HCV的治疗结果在早期治疗时要好得多。 感染，因此，鉴定急性HCV患者具有极大的临床益处， 病毒根除的可能性大大提高。干预措施，如咨询，安全针头技术，甲型肝炎和B型肝炎病毒的免疫接种也是 必要在没有任何系统方法的情况下，初步的努力已经确定了19例急性HCV病例，这些病例是在30个月的时间内从2个被监禁的人群中确定的。该项目旨在改善马萨诸塞州惩教所内对此类对象的识别 系统，描述他们的临床课程，同时提供咨询，教育， 对已识别的个人进行治疗。在惩教系统中确定的个人 补充巴西队列，因为与IVDU相关的急性HCV并不常见。 发生在巴西患者身上。此外，我们的目标是分析差异，探索 种族对HCV表现的影响。因此，这两支队伍将使我们能够 探讨HCV感染的危险因素对急性HCV感染免疫学的影响。

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infects approximately 20-40% of the millions of incarcerated individuals in the United States. While many studies have characterized the seroincidence of chronic HCV infection, none have specifically addressed the issue of acute HCV infection. Since incarceration is associated with new onset intravenous drug use, such individuals would be at high risk for acute HCV infection. Screening of high-risk populations will shed insight into the incidence and clinical course of individuals and allow for characterization of their immune responses. Moreover, treatment outcomes for HCV are far better when treating early in infection, therefore identification of individuals with acute HCV is of extreme clinical benefit due to the greatly enhanced possibility of viral eradication. Interventions such as counseling, safe-needle techniques, and immunizations against hepatitis A and hepatitis B virus are also necessary. Without any systematic approach, preliminary efforts have identified 19 cases of acute HCV identified from 2 populations of incarcerated individuals over a 30-month period. This project aims to improve the identification of such subjects within the Massachusetts correctional system, describe their clinical courses, while providing access to counseling, education, and treatment for the identified individuals. Individuals identified in the correctional system uniquely complement the Brazilian cohort, since acute HCV associated with IVDU is not a frequent occurrence in our Brazilian patients. Moreover, we aim to analyze differences that explore the influence of race on the presentation of HCV. Therefore, the two cohorts will allow us to address the impact of risk factor for HCV acquisition on the immunology of acute HCV infection.