Prevalence, characteristics and management of occult hepatitis B virus infection in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia: a single center experience

Several reports have emphasized the risk of hepatitis B virus (HBV) reactivation in patients with lymphoproliferative disorders undergoing cytotoxic treatment. To determine the prevalence of occult B infection (OBI) in a population with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and management with universal prophylaxis (UP) in all patients undergoing chemoimmunotherapy or targeted prophylaxis (TP) in patients experiencing seroreversion during therapy, we analyzed 397 patients with CLL from our database. The prevalence of OBI in our patients with CLL was 8.6% (34 patients). When comparing patients with OBI/CLL with those with CLL, we did not find any statistical difference among clinical-biological parameters and time dependent endpoints except for a lower peripheral blood lymphocyte count in the OBI/CLL group (p = 0.036). From 2000 to 2010 careful follow-up and TP were adopted; two out of 10 patients (20%) showed seroreversion. From June 2010 we adopted UP during and 12 months after immunosuppressive treatment in all patients with CLL with OBI; no evidence of seroreversion was detected.