Anticardiolipin antibodies and vascular access thrombosis in Taiwanese haemodialysis patients with chronic hepatitis C: a retrospective study

Hepatitis C virus causes various extrahepatic immunologic abnormalities. Vascular access thrombosis (VAT) is a major cause of morbidity in chronic haemodialysis (HD) patients. Immunoglobulin-G anticardiolipin antibody (IgG-ACA) is strongly associated with venous and arterial thrombosis in patients with normal renal function. Previous investigations have reported the association of raised IgG-ACA titre recurrent with VAT in HD patient, and also few equivalent studies were reported the same in Taiwan. This study attempted to determine whether raised IgG-ACA titres are associated with increased risk of recurrent VAT in HD patients with chronic hepatitis C. This study enrolled 98 chronic hepatitis C patients undergoing HD. IgG-ACA titre and hepatitis C marker were measured for all subjects. Raised IgG-ACA titres were present in 29.6% (29/98) of patients. In both groups (raised and normal IgG-ACA), the type of shunt did not differ (p = 0.416). There was strong association between raised IgG-ACA titre and recurrent VAT (p = 0.0004). In predicting for more or one episodes of VAT using multiple logistic regression, synthetic graft (p < 0.0001), raised IgG-ACA titre (p = 0.039), presence of hepatitis B (p = 0.004) and haemodialysis duration (p = 0.039) were significant factors. The prevalence of raised IgG-ACA titres was 39.6% among chronic hepatitis C with HD patients. There was strong association between raised IgG-ACA titre and recurrent VAT, and this finding may be the consequence of pathogenetic role of raised IgG-ACA titres on the development of VAT status in HD patients with chronic hepatitis C.