BCL-2 Gene Polymorphisms and hGH Levels in HCV Patients: Molecular Genetic and Hormonal Biomarkers for HCV Response to IFN/RBV Combination Therapy

The prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection varies across the world, with the highest number of infections reported in Egypt. The main objectives of the present work are to examine whether BCL-2 gene polymorphism at codon 43 (+127G/A or Ala43Thr) has an impact on HCV response to IFN-alfa2b and ribavirin, and to explore the impact of response to interferon and ribavirin antiviral therapy on human growth hormone (hGH) levels in Egyptian chronic hepatitis C genotype-4 infected patients. *Prof. Dr. Emad Eskander is a professor of Biochemistry, Medical Research Division, National Research Centre, Egypt. He Had a Ph.D. in Chemistry, Cairo University, Faculty of Science, 1989. He had Diploma of Medicinal Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Georgia (U.S.A.), 1993. He had one USA patent and two Egyptian patent. He published more than fifty papers. *Dr. Shaymaa Yahya is a researcher of Medical Division & Biomedical informatics group, CEAS, National Research Centre. Dr yahya is the CoPI for a running project in the field of Molecular Virology. She has worked as a member of a project at STRC, American University in Cairo (AUC). She published more than ten international papers.