European Journal of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences

OVERVIEW OF HEPATITIS B SURFACE ANTIGEN INCIDENCE AMONG PREGNANT WOMEN IN KING HUSSEIN MEDICAL CENTRE AND PRINCE HASHEM HOSPITAL

Rami Rbeihat MD, Sami Hijazeen MD*, Yara Sahawneh MD, Haitham Rbeihat MD, Ola Ali Mjali Al Horani and Hala Alsokhni MD

ABSTRACT

Objective: To determine the prevalence of hepatitis B surface antigen among pregnant women presenting to antenatal care clinic in Prince Hashem Hospital in Zarqa city and King Hussein Medical Centre (KHMC) in Amman, Jordan. Method: This was a cross-sectional study conducted on 256randomly selected pregnant women attending the antenatal care clinic in two different hospitals (quaternary and tertiary centres) during the period from July 2017 to January 2018 in Prince Hashem Hospital (Tertiary) and KHMC (Quaternary). The targeted group for this study was pregnant women who were born before 1993, because they had not received the Hepatitis B Recombinant Vaccine as it was only added to the National Jordanian Vaccination Program on 1993. Therefore, 56 women were excluded and the total number of included women was 200. Blood samples were collected from these patients and sent to the laboratory for Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) detection by Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA). Results: The age range of the studied women was 26–50 years with mean age of 38 years. Out of 200 tested women, 7 were positive for HBsAg, accounting for 3.5%. Conclusion: Hepatitis B surface antigen positivity in pregnant women reflects an increased risk of vertical transmission of the virus to unborn babies. Therefore, all pregnant women attending antenatal care should be tested for HBV infection; infected women should be followed-up and their babies must receive HBV vaccines at birth.

Keywords: Hepatitis B surface antigen, Hepatitis B virus, pregnant women.