Quantitative Anti-HBc in Liver Pathological States in Patients with Chronic Hepatitis B Virus Infection

Table 3

Differences in median of anti-HBc among different pathological grades and stages and between HBeAg-positive and HBeAg-negative patients.

	HBeAg-positive (n = 254)		HBeAg-negative (n = 237)		Z
	n	Anti-HBc, median (IQR)	n	Anti-HBc, median (IQR)
Grade
G1	153	3.399 (2.849–3.669)^ab	182	4.104 (3.598–4.557)^cd	9.442	<0.0001
G2	85	3.643 (3.383–4.011)^a	39	4.413 (4.125–4.829)^c	6.213	<0.0001
G3	16	3.789 (3.478–3.948)^b	16	4.885 (4.100–>5.000)^d	3.138	0.0017
	χ^2	24.785	χ^2	17.305
		<0.0001		0.0002
Stage
S1	115	3.403 (2.624–3.697)^ef	140	4.160 (3.593–4.576)	8.184	<0.0001
S2	89	3.491 (3.265–3.731)^g	47	4.116 (3.683–4.612)	5.226	<0.0001
S3	16	3.801 (3.347–4.039)^e	16	4.308 (3.849–4.559)	2.864	0.0042
S4	34	3.785 (3.511–4.060)^fg	34	4.378 (4.034–>5.000)	4.272	<0.0001
	χ^2	19.822	χ^2	6.886
		0.0002		0.0756

IQR, interquartile range. ^#Comparison among different grades and stages, Kruskal–Wallis test. Comparison between HBeAg-positive and HBeAg-negative patients, Mann–Whitney U test. ^a–gPairwise comparisons between different grades and stages, , by post hoc analysis.