Abstract: Objective To investigate the clinical characteristics of Uighur children with hepatitis A in Hotan.
Methods Clinical data of 96 cases of hepatitis A in Hotan were retrospectively analyzed. The differences
of liver function and hospitalization time before and after treatment, age, gender and association with
malnutrition or anemia in children were compared, respectively. Results The average age of the children
was (3.4 ± 1.9) years old. The ratio of male to female was 1.8∶1. The incidence of acute hepatitis with
jaundice was 68.8%. There was no difference between children with different gender in hospitalization time,
ALT, AST, TBil and DBil (P = 0.982, 0.317, 0.637, 0.310 and 0.764). The levels of TBil and DBil of school
children were higher than young children and preschoolers (P = 0.002 and 0.004), while the values of ALT,
AST and hospitalization time had no statistically significant difference (P = 0.13, 0.072 and 0.058). Compared
with the normal group, there were no differences in the hospitalization time, ALT, AST, TBil and DBil of
children with malnutrition or anemia (P = 0.352, 0.808, 0.882, 0.897 and 0.828). There was one pediatric
patient who progressed to liver failure. Conclusions Children with jaundice accounted for a major part of the
pediatric patient with hepatitis A. School children had serious liver damage compared with preschoolers and
young children.