Treatment of chronic hepatitis C with pegylated interferon plus ribavirin in treatment-naïve ‘real-life’ patients in India

Abstract

SVR rates in CHC patients treated in 'real-life' setting in India were better than those reported in western population. Therapy should be prolonged for patients with cirrhosis, while one-fifth of patients may qualify for abbreviated therapy. Factors significantly associated with SVR were age <40 years, absence of cirrhosis, RVR, and no reduction in interferon dose.

Demographic profile, host, disease & viral predictive factors of response in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus infection at a tertiary care hospital in north India

“…In view of availability of the DAAs now in India, addition of peg interferon to sofosbuvir and ribavirin is likely to further enhance the SVR in such patients. The higher SVR rates for genotype 1 may be due to low viral load and lesser degree of fibrosis which has also been observed in previous studies 28 29 .…”

“…Similar response rates have been documented in various clinical trials reported from West 2 4 . Another study from north India also reported a similar response rate 28 , whereas a recent study describing real life scenario reported SVR rates of 78 per cent in genotype 328. The high SVR rates may be due to the fact that cirrhosis, which is an important predictor of response, was present in only 21 per cent of patients.…”

Impact of Direct Acting Antiviral Therapy for Treatment of Hepatitis C Genotypes 1, 3 and 4: A Real Life Experience from India

“…Our previous real life experience with pegylated interferon and RBV showed a much lower (one-third) acceptance for initiation of treatment and low SVR rates due to poor tolerability (6%) and non response (1%). 25 In the present cohort of patients treated with DAAs, 77% of the patients diagnosed with hepatitis C infection opted for treatment and the therapy was well tolerated even in difficult to treat groups of patients like those with cirrhosis and past history of treatment failure. There were no major adverse events requiring discontinuation of therapy.…”

Optimal Duration of Pegylated Interferon Plus Ribavirin Therapy for Chronic Hepatitis C Genotype 3 Patients who do not Achieve Rapid Virological Response

“…1 Chronic hepatitis C (CHC) has been conventionally treated with combination of pegylated interferonalpha and ribavirin (PEG-RBV) therapy since many years. 1,2 Although newer therapeutic options have been recently approved for the treatment of CHC, 3,4 their use in the developing countries is limited due to high cost and non-availability. Various host and virological factors are known to affect the response to treatment, of which HCV genotype and treatment duration are important factors affecting sustained virologic response (SVR).…”

“…5,6 The recommended duration of PEG-RBV therapy for CHC treatment-naive G-3 patients is for 24 weeks, which provides SVR rates of 69-82%. 1,2 Hadzyannis et al compared the efficacy of 48 weeks versus 24 weeks PEG-RBV therapy in CHC G-3 patients and reported no significant difference in overall SVR rates in the 2 arms. 7 However, in their study, analysis was done based on early virological response (EVR) and SVR, as the concept of rapid virological response (RVR) had not evolved by that time.…”