Hepatitis Viruses in Kidney Transplantation

Hepatitis viruses are named for their primary clinical illness, inflammation of the liver. Currently, six types of viruses are designated hepatitis viruses (A, B, C, D, E, and G), although only five of these cause hepatitis. Hepatitis viruses are composed of RNA and DNA viruses from different families and with different virologic properties, some of which typically cause acute hepatitis while others cause acute and chronic hepatitis. In addition to their role in liver disease, members of this group of viruses may cause a variety of pathologic changes in the kidney and other organs, and chronic infection may lead to cirrhosis in addition to raising a variety of important issues in the management of kidney transplant recipients. In this brief report, we review the virologic and clinical properties of each of the hepatitis viruses, and highlight the role of each virus in renal disease and kidney transplantation.