Abstract

Combination of interferon alfa and ribavirin is the first therapeutic choice in chronic hepatitis C. The aim of this study is to assess long-term outcome of chronic hepatitis C patients treated with pegasys plus ribavirin. We evaluated a cohort of 49 chronic hepatitis C patients who were treated for 48 weeks with pegylated interferon alpha 2a and ribavirin and followed up till week 72 in order to evaluate sustained virological response (SVR) and more than 70% of the patients were followed up over 5 years. In week 72 (the time of achieving SVR), 28 patients were found with SVR (57.14%), 10 were relapse and 11 no response. Long-term viral response (LTR) was defined as remained HCV RNA negativity during long time after SVR. LTR was found in 96.3% of those who had SVR. Late viral relapse occurred within first year after SVR in one patient. Three of 10 patients (30%) who were retreated, obtained SVR. Among the whole patients, 4 had cirrhosis in pre-treatment liver biopsy in which 2 of them got progress to clinical cirrhosis during follow up. No hepatocellular carcinoma occurred during the follow up. The patients who achieved SVR; remained in it chronically and had predictable outcome throughout long-term.

Key words: Chronic hepatitis C, long-term outcomes, pegylated interferon, ribavirin.

Abbreviation

Abbreviations: HCV, Hepatitis C virus; SVR, sustained viral response; LTR, long-term viral response; IFN, interferon; PEG-IFN, pegylated interferon; SD, standard deviation; RNA, ribonucleic acid; HCC, hepatocellular carcinoma; ALT, alanine transaminase; PT, prothrombine time; PLT, platelet; N, number.