European vs. Egyptian HCV-4 patients with elevated baseline HCV RNA, treated with PEG-IFN-α2a and ribavirin: the role of rapid and early virologic response.
OBJECTIVE
Despite the recent spread of hepatitis C virus genotype 4 (HCV-4) into European countries, very little is known about the influence of ethnicity on treatment outcomes in patients with HCV-4. The aim of this study was to compare the virologic response (VR) rates of: rapid virologic response (RVR), early virologic response (EVR), VR at 24 weeks of treatment, at end of treatment (EoT), and sustained virologic response (SVR) of European and Egyptian HCV-4 patients.


METHODS
Sixty (30 Europeans - Group A; and 30 Egyptians - Group B) chronic HCV-4 subtype A adult patients with elevated baseline viral load (>800 000 IU/m L) were treated for a fixed period of 48 weeks with pegylated interferon α2a (PEG-IFN- α2a) and ribavirin. During the study, HCV-RNA levels were measured at weeks 4,12,24,48 and 72.


RESULTS
Baseline characteristics, including liver histology, were similar in the two groups. RVR, EVR and HCV-RNA at week 24 in Groups A and B were (RVR 26.7% vs. 30.0%) (EVR 23.3% vs. 16.7%) (in week 24 13.3% vs. 16.7%). Overall SVR rates were 36.7% (11/30) for Group A and 26.7% (8/30) for Group B (P = 0.59). For group B, RVR was the weakest indicator for SVR as compared with RVR of group A, where RVR was the best SVR indicator


CONCLUSIONS
The overall response to treatment was similar, but ethnic origin or previous history and treatment of schistosomiasis may influence intermediate response rates of chronic HCV-4a infected patients with elevated baseline HCV-RNA.
Department of Gastroenterology, Agios Savvas Hospital, Athens, Greece. dimitroulopoulos@gmail.com
Dimitrios
D
Dimitroulopoulos
Ioannis
I
Elefsiniotis
Christos
C
Pavlidis
Dimitrios
D
Xinopoulos
Klisthenis
K
Tsamakidis
Stamatina
S
Patsavela
Dimitrios
D
Kypreos
Ageliki
A
Ferderigou
Dimitrios
D
Korkolis
Sotirios
S
Koutsounas
Georgios
G
Saroglou
Emmanouil
E
Paraskevas