[Hospital-acquired serum hepatitis (author's transl)].

During a prospective study of blood transfusions at the Cardiac Surgery Unit of the University Surgical Clinic, Free University, Berlin, a patient developed hepatitis B although he had not received any blood transfusion. Soon after, two further patients developed B-hepatitis and a third had HBs-antigenaemia. A virus marker confirmed the infectious pathways. None of the three infected patients had received foreign blood or large-pool clotting preparations. These special circumstances made it possible to diagnose hospital-acquired serum hepatitis. Otherwise all three cases would probably have been considered as caused by transfusion of foreign blood or blood products. It is, therefore, recommended that in similar cases one should speak of hospital-acquired hepatitis and of transfusion hepatitis only when this can be proven.