Efficacy of Lamivudine Therapy on Decompensated Liver Cirrhosis Due to Chronic Hepatitis B

The aim of this study was to determine the effect of lamivudine on liver function and clinicalstatus of the patients with decompensated cirrhosis arising from hepatitis b virus (hbv).methods: in a clinical trial on the basis of liver consideration in 55 patients with cirrhosis that had positive hbsag andhbv dna, child-pugh score more than 8 and some other criteria were treated with lamivudine. in these patients, serumlevel of bilirubin, albumin, alt, ast and also the pt-inr were controlled at the beginning of study and then at intervalsof 2 to 6 months and finally 12 months after the start of treatment.results: five patients died in the first 6 months of treatments. the following results are related to 50 patients beingunder treatment with lamivudine at least for a period of 6 months. in these patients mean child-pugh score wasdecreased from 11 (plus-minus) 2 to 7 (plus-minus) 1 (p (less than) 0.0001). all of the patients tolerated this drug very well.conclusions: lamivudine can be effective in improvement of liver function in patients with decompensated livercirrhosis resulting from hbv, but for determination of proper period of treatment, further studies are necessary.