Clinica chimica acta; international journal of clinical chemistry
-
Adefovir dipivoxil (ADV) is effective for treatment of chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, but long-time ADV therapy leads to drug resistance because of HBV reverse transcriptase mutations. We developed a sensitive and specific method for detecting the rtA181V/T and rtN236T mutations associated with ADV resistance in chronic hepatitis B patients, based on a ligase detection reaction (LDR). ⋯ The PCR-LDR assay can sensitively and specifically detect the rtA181V/T and rtN236T mutations, and may be used for monitoring ADV resistance in patients infected with HBV.