Hepatitis E is an infectious viral disease with clinical and morphologic features of acute hepatitis. Although HEV infection is endemic in the Indian subcontinent, Southeast and Central Asia, a large outbreak of hepatitis E was identified in China. Smaller outbreaks have been observed in the Middle East, northern and western parts of Africa, and Mexico. Sporadic hepatitis E also has been observed in several countries. In nonendemic regions, the sporadic cases of hepatitis E are almost always associated with travel to HEV-endemic regions. In Korea, there has been no report on hepatitis E. Recently, we experienced a case of acute icteric hepatitis in which serologic study showed seroconversion of IgM anti-HEV. The patient did not have any travel history to an HEV-endemic area. We report this as an initial case of acute hepatitis E in Korea. (Korean J Hepatol 2002;8:312-316)
