Study on Changes in Serum Adenosine Deaminase Activity in Patients with Hepatitis

A case control study was undertaken to find out the significance of serum adenosine deaminase activity in hepatitis, to correlate the changes in serum adenosine deaminase activity with respect to other liver function tests and to evaluate its clinical usefulness in diagnosis of hepatitis. Out of total 60 subjects, 30 healthy individuals were taken as control group and 30 cases of different types of hepatitis were taken as test group. The serum Adenosine deaminase and liver function tests were done by colorimetric methods. The mean serum adenosine deaminase activity in control group and the test group were found to be 21.3+3.69 U/L and 73.3+18.33 U/L respectively with a significance of P<0.001. Positive correlation have been found between adenosine deaminase and some parameters of liver function tests such as total bilirubin and serum transaminases in hepatitis which is significant with P<0.05. So, serum adenosine deaminase activity in hepatitis is significantly raised than that in the normal healthy persons and is increased with increasing levels of serum transaminases and total bilirubin levels. The study concluded that determination of serum adenosine deaminase along with liver function test would increase both the sensitivity and the specificity of laboratory tests in the detection of hepatitis.