Fig. 5.

The serum IL-15 level of IFN-treated patients with type C chronic liver disease and controls. The IL-15 level was quantified by ELISA. Unpaired Student’s t-test was used to assess the statistical significance of differences in serum IL-15 levels between sera from controls and HCV-infected patients before treatment. Paired Student’s t-test was used to compare serially assayed serum IL-15 of the HCV-infected patients. Circles indicate the individual serum IL-15 levels of the controls (open circle) and HCV-infected patients (closed circle). Horizontal bars show mean ± SD in each sample group. *P<0.0001