Dou Y, et al. - In order to assess the biomarkers for predicting pegylated IFNα [PEG-IFN: one of the treatment options for chronic hepatitis B virus (CHB) patients] response in view of the high patient treatment burden and limited response rate, researchers measured soluble CD14 [sCD14: a marker for immune activation and a predictor of clinical outcome of HIV infection] levels in CHB patients and investigated the relation of their changes with PEG-IFN response. They examined serum sCD14 levels in 15 healthy controls, 15 acute self-limited hepatitis B virus, 60 CHB patients in different disease phases and 94 HBeAg+ CHB patients at week 0 and week 12 of a 52-week PEG-IFN treatment. In this study, for the first time, the relation of sCD14 levels with PEG-IFN treatment response in CHB was established. They noted an increased probability of clinical response defined as either HBeAg seroconversion or HBeAg loss in correlation to a high rise in serum sCD14 in CHB patients at the first 12 weeks of PEG-IFN treatment. In addition, elevated serum sCD14 levels were noted in acute self-limited hepatitis B virus but not in CHB relative to healthy controls. Besides the HBsAg-based stopping rule provided in the 2017 European Association for the Study of the Liver guideline for PEG-IFN treatment for CHB, this study suggests the possible value of sCD14 as an additional predictive marker to ascertain the likelihood of sustained response to PEG-IFN in HBeAg+ CHB patients at week 12.