Abstract: Objective　To investigate the correlation of serum hepatitis B virus (HBV) large envelope protein (LHBs) with HBV infection and replication. Methods　Serum HBV DNA load， LHBs and hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) of 282 patients with hepatitis B and 30 healthy controls were detected. LHBs was compared with HBeAg basing on HBV DNA load. Results　Among 107 patients whose serum HBV DNA loads were <10³ copies/mL， 9(8.41%) patients were LHBs positive, and 8(7.48%) patients were HBeAg positive. The linear correlation coefficients of LHBs and HBeAg with the scale of HBV DNA load were 0.972 1 and 0.837 0 respectively(P<0.01, P<0.05). To diagnose HBV infection， the sensitivities， specificities， positive predictive values， negative predictive values and accuracies of LHBs were 92.57%， 82.52%， 77.43%， 59.18% and 97.05%， respectively, and the values of HBeAg were 62.35%， 77.17%， 64.08%， 51.22% and 89.16%， respectively. Conclusions　LHBs is a good index to reflect the situation of HBV replication. The combined determination of LHBs， HBV DNA and HBeAg of hepatitis B patients contributes to the clinical diagnosis， therapeutic effect monitoring and prognosis evaluation.

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