Background: The course of chronic HBV infection is modified by HIV-coexistence.
Objective: To analyze the role of HBV genomic heterogeneity in basal core promoter (BCP) and precore (Pc) genomic regions.
Study design: In a 3-yr prospective study, 39 HBV infected patients (20 monoinfected and 19 HIV-coinfected) were included. Eighty-two HBV isolates were studied at quasispecies level in the BCP/Pc genomic region. Clinical records obtained include data on lamivudine therapy and resistance mutations, HBV and HIV-viral load.
Results: HBV isolates were predominantly ascribed to genotype (Gt) A2 among HBV-monoinfected and HIV-coinfected patients. BCP mutations in isolates from monoinfected patients were significantly more frequent than in those from coinfected ones, irrespective of the HBe expression pattern (p<0.0001). Regardless of the HIV-coexistence, the Pc mutation at G1896A only barely appeared among clone-derived sequences of GtF1 isolates, mainly from HBe(-) HBV-monoinfected patients.
Conclusions: HBV isolates characterized from HIV-coinfected patients seem to be more prone to exhibit a wild type genomic pattern at BCP regulatory region with respect to those from HBV-monoinfected ones. Besides, mutations at Pc region might be genotype-dependent in their frequency but not on HIV co-presence related.