This Article  • Full text PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Frank Iber, MD

JAMA. 1981;245(8):849-850.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

Three immunologically distinct viruses produce a clinically similar viral hepatitis; yet there are differences between these viruses that affect patient outcome. Each disease has an influenza-like prodromal period of about one week, followed by a phase of liver cell necrosis that causes nausea and vomiting and, for many persons, mild jaundice. Adults are often incapacitated for two to six weeks by an attack of hepatitis, but fewer than two in 100 have any permanent injury from the attack. Each of the three types of hepatitis confer lifelong immunity. The three types of hepatitis are called hepatitis A (HA), hepatitis B (HB), and non-A, non-B hepatitis (NANB).

A practitioner should know about each of the three types of hepatitis because (1) the type influences the death rate, the carrier status, and the occurrence of chronic liver disease; (2) the type influences infectivity to the family and other associates; and (3) prophylaxis . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
University of Maryland School of Medicine Baltimore

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?