Sustained suppression of viral replication in improving vitamin D serum concentrations in patients with chronic hepatitis B

Recently, the role of vitamin D in chronic hepatitis B (CHB) has attracted a lot attention. In this study, 128 naïve CHB patients (91 with positive HBeAg, 37 with negative-HBeAg) were enrolled, and 128 volunteers without liver diseases were enrolled as controls. Compared to that of healthy controls, the mean level of 25(OH)D(3) in CHB patients was significantly lower; and the percent of patients with sufficient 25(OH)D(3) (≥20 ng/mL) was also significantly lower than that of healthy controls. Among those CHB patients, the level of 25(OH)D(3) was negatively correlated with the serum HBV-DNA level. Additionally, the level of 25(OH)D(3) was significantly lower in HBeAg-positive patients than that in HBeAg-negative patients. After the patients went through the long-term antiviral treatments, both the mean level of 25(OH)D(3) and the percent of patients with sufficient 25(OH)D(3) increased significantly. Additionally, patients who were HBeAg free after the treatment also had much higher 25(OH)D(3) level than those with persistent positive HBeAg. All those data suggested that the low vitamin D serum level was dangerous for CHB patients, and the level of 25(OH)D(3) was highly negatively correlated with HBV-DNA levels. Effective antiviral therapy might increase the level of vitamin D in CHB patients.