Environmental risk factors are associated with autoimmune hepatitis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Failure of immunologic homeostasis and resultant hepatocyte destruction in autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) is likely the result of environmental triggers within a permissive genetic architecture.

Aims

We aimed to identify risk factors associated with AIH in a well-phenotyped AIH cohort.

Methods

We prospectively collected environmental questionnaires from 358 AIH cases and 563 healthy controls. Response frequencies were compared using logistic regression, adjusting for age at recruitment, sex and education.

Results

AIH cases were more likely to ever have a urinary tract infection (UTI) (53.6% vs 33.9%, P < .001) and recurrent UTI (more than 1 per year) (23.5% vs 15.9%, P = .002) compared to controls. Female cases more frequently had ever used oral contrace

SUBMITTER: Lammert C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8496440 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature