Cytomegalovirus hepatitis (diagnosis and differential diagnosis).

In a 12-year-old female patients with HBAg phi hepatitis a differential diagnosis of the diseases has been considered. The CMV etiology of the hepatitis was suspected on the basis of a persistent temperature, hepatomegaly, a mild icterus, enlarged glands in the neck, predominantly mononuclear cells in the peripheral blood, a negative Paul-Bunnell test, and insufficiently characteristic biochemical analyses for virus A hepatitis. The CMV etiology of the disease was virologically confirmed. On the basis of the clinical picture without virological results, the diagnosis could not have been made with certainty.