OBJECTIVE:

To characterize the epidemiological profile of hepatitis C cases investigated by the Núcleo de Vigilância Epidemiológica of the Hospital de Doenças Tropicais Dr. Anuar Auad in Goiânia, Goiás State, Brazil, from 2012 to 2015.

MATERIALS AND METHODS:

A cross-sectional epidemiological study was conducted with secondary data of confirmed hepatitis C cases obtained from the Brazilian Information System for Notifiable Diseases (Sinan). Data were tabulated in TabWin and analyzed in Epi Info™. The statistical test used was the Chi-square.

RESULTS:

From the total of 293 hepatitis C cases, mean age was 50.7 years (SD ± 12.4) and 54.95% occurred in males with the predominance of brown skin color (75.09%). About education, 34.81% had between five and nine years of study. The proportion of genotypes found were 77.10% for type 1, 1.53% for type 2, 19.84% for type 3, and 1.53% for type 4. Regarding health conditions, a significant association was found between hepatitis C virus (HCV) and HIV coinfection (p < 0.001).

CONCLUSION:

The profile found for HCV patients in this study was similar to those available in the literature. It is important to know the frequency of HCV in order to understand its dissemination thus to have subsidies to assure control measures against infection, since hepatitis C is a public health problem.

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