The epidemiology of primary biliary cirrhosis: immunological problems.

Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) has received considerable attention as an autoimmune disease, where in addition to immunological mechanisms, environmental factors may have an important role. Therefore the epidemiological analysis of disease prevalence and progression in association with immunological studies has been one of the hot areas of PBC research during recent years. In this paper the epidemiological data on PBC and its immunological marker--anti-mitochondrial antibodies--have been presented from a comparative viewpoint.