DR Christopher Kong San Choon | What is Hepatitis B
Q: What is Hepatitis B
Hepatitis B is a virus infection. The virus infects the body
and mainly attacks the liver.
There’s the initial phase where is the acute phase.
And this may result in the patient clearing most of the virus
from the body. Or the virus may become more quiescent and the
patient becomes a chronic Hepatitis B carrier.
When they become a Hepatitis B carrier, they enter what we call a latent phase
where it slowly causes problem in the body as long as the patient is well.
Now, Hepatitis B is quite common in the world. It’s estimated that about 2 billion have had previous
infection or having infection at this moment in time.
From the World Health Organisation data in 2015, it’s just that there
are about over 200million people who are chronic carriers of Hepatitis B.
In fact, the data suggest that in that year alone, over 800thousand people,
has had serious complications or passed away from Hepatitis B related disease.
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Senior Consultant, Gastroenterology & Hepatology (Liver)
StarMed Specialist Centre
Dr Christopher Kong San Choon is a specialist in the field of Gastroenterology. He was inducted as a Member of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland in 1999. Dr Kong completed his training in General Internal Medicine (GIM) and Gastroenterology in the UK, and was accredited into the United Kingdom Speciality register in 2007 for both GIM and Gastroenterology.
Dr Kong has been involved in multiple clinical trials and research studies, with multiple publications in scientific and clinical journals. He performed the first motorised spiral enteroscopy in Southeast Asia in 2019, a new technique which makes it possible for small intestines to be thoroughly examined in just 30 minutes, in contrast to 6 hours by balloon-assisted endoscopes.
He also helped set up the Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology in Sengkang General Hospital as Clinical Lead of the department. Dr Kong previously served as Senior Consultant in Singapore General Hospital and was Director of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Centre.
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