Abstract: Objective　To investigate the expression and significance of decoy receptor（DcR3）in hepatitis B virus（HBV）e-antigen（HBeAg）negative chronic hepatitis B（CHB）patients.   Methods　Serum DcR3 levels were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay（ELISA）in 80 HBeAg negative CHB patients and 96 healthy subjects. Alanine aminotransferase（ALT）was determined by automatic analyzer. Serum HBV DNA was determined by polymerase chain reaction（PCR).  Results　DcR3 level in HBeAg negative CHB patients [1.58(0.48-3.23)ng/mL]was significantly higher than that in healthy controls [0.83(0.16-2.32）ng/mL，P＜0.000 1]. DcR3 level was correlated positively with HBV DNA （r＝0.704，P＜0.000 1）and ALT （r＝0.732，P＜0.000 1).  Conclusions　DcR3 has high expression and correlates with HBV DNA and ALT in HBeAg negative CHB patients，and DcR3 may serve as a diagnosis and treatment monitoring indicator for HBeAg negative CHB patients.

Key words: Decoy receptor 3, Chronic hepatitis B, Alanine aminotransferase, DNA