Official title: Immunological and Virological Characterization of Patients With Chronic HBV-HDV Infection: Association With Disease Outcomes and Response to Bulevirtide Treatment Summary: Pharmacological, single-center, non-profit observational study. The present study is part of a cooperation project between the SC Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Fondazione IRCCS Ca' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico (Milan, Italy), the University of Milan, the University of Parma and Rome Tor Vergata, funded under the call for Research Projects of Significant National Interest - 2022 PNRR Call (Prot.
P2022WEXP2). Hepatitis D virus (HDV) is a defective RNA virus, which requires the presence of hepatitis B virus (HBV) to infect liver cells and propagate.
To date, the mechanisms underlying the accelerated disease progression in the natural history of Delta hepatitis are poorly understood, as is the course of the HDV-specific immune response (CD4 and CD8 T cells). As in chronic HBV and HCV infections, the outcome of chronic HDV infection appears to be dictated primarily by the host immune response, which represents a key determinant for virus control or persistence.
Immunological and Virological Profiling in Chronic HBV-HDV Infection: Study Design and Intent
In HBV/HDV coinfection, precise delineation of T cell roles is limited by the lack of robust animal models and the limited mapping of HDV-specific T cell epitopes, particularly across HLA alleles.