DEFINITION OF AUTOIMMUNE HEPATITIS AND LABORATORY FEATURES
Keywords:
autoimmune hepatitis, serum bilirubin, alkaline phosphatase, globulin, aminotransferase, hypergammaglobulinemia.Abstract
Autoimmune hepatitis is a chronic disorder characterized by continuing hepatocellular necrosis and inflammation, usually with fibrosis, which can progress to cirrhosis and liver failure. When fulfilling criteria of severity, this type of chronic hepatitis, when untreated, may have a 6-month mortality of as high as 40%. Based on contemporary estimates of the natural history of treated autoimmune hepatitis, the 10-year survival is 80–90%. The prominence of extrahepatic features of autoimmunity as well as seroimmunologic abnormalities in this disorder supports an autoimmune process in its pathogenesis; this concept is reflected in the labels lupoid, plasma cell, or autoimmune hepatitis. Autoantibodies and other typical features of autoimmunity, however, do not occur in all cases; among the broader categories of “idiopathic” or cryptogenic chronic hepatitis, many, perhaps the majority, are probably autoimmune in origin.
