Survey of hepatitis B status in hemodialysis patients in a training hospital in Urmia, Iran.

To evaluate the prevalence of HBV infection in chronic hemodialysis patients at our dialysis center of Urmia's Taleqni Hospital, Urmia, Iran, we studied cross-sectionally the hepatitis surface antigen (HbsAg) status in blood samples of 167 active chronic hemodialysis patients at our center with enzyme linked immunosorbant assay (ELISA). The mean frequency of HbsAg+ was 6.58%, which was higher in patients less than 50 years old than in those above 50 years (9.3% vs. 5.3%, respectively), in males than females (10.5% vs. 2.5%, respectively), and in those on three times dialysis than twice per week (7.1% vs. 0.0%, respectively). We did not find a significant relationship between the factors of: age, sex, being resident in city or village, duration of the therapy, history of blood transfusion, marital status, job status, history of kidney transplantation, and prevalence of HbsAg+.