Chronic urticaria following acute hepatitis A
- 1Department of Infectious Diseases, Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, Herston, Queensland, Australia
- 2Department of Medicine, Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, Herston, Queensland, Australia
- Correspondence to Dr Paul M Griffin, drpaulgriffin{at}optusnet.com.au
Summary
Urticaria has a documented association with the prodromal phases of hepatitis A, B and, although still contentious, likely hepatitis C. Despite the documented association there are few actual reported cases of urticaria occurring with hepatitis A infection and in all of the cases reported so far the urticaria preceded the diagnosis of hepatitis A and was acute rather than chronic. We describe a case of urticaria occurring following acute infection with hepatitis A, which persisted beyond 6 weeks and therefore was by definition chronic. Although chronic urticaria has been reported to be associated with other forms of viral hepatitis, to the best of our knowledge this has not been reported previously with hepatitis A.
