Hepatitis C News

A vaccine that would provide incomplete immunity against hepatitis C virus could still reduce the spread of the virus among drug users sharing syringes, according to study results published in Science Translational Medicine.

Kidney transplant with a kidney infected with hepatitis C virus, followed by treatment for the hepatitis C, was effective and reduced costs compared with transplant with an uninfected kidney after hepatitis C treatment, according to new research published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

Liver disease-related mortality rates varied significantly by geographic region in the Untied States with some of the highest rates in the South and the West, in areas with higher Hispanic populations, and areas of lower household income, according to a recently published study.

Results of recent study in France showed that universal hepatitis C screening was the most effective strategy and was cost-effective when treatment was initiated regardless of patient fibrosis stage.

Patients with hepatitis C genotype 3 with compensated cirrhosis achieved a sustained virologic response rate higher than 90% after treatment with Epclusa with or without ribavirin, according to results of a recently published phase 3 study.

Hepatitis C with comorbid alcohol use disorder correlated with increased depression and anxiety, dysregulated cytokine expression, and compromised blood-brain barrier function, according to a recently published study.

Just 10 years ago, patients with HIV and end-stage renal disease were often sent home to die from Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, because of limited access to dialysis and a shrinking organ donor pool. Then, in a pioneering program, physicians at the hospital began transplanting kidneys from HIV-positive donors into HIV-positive recipients, starting with four successful transplants. They announced the new therapeutic approach in a six-paragraph letter to The New England Journal of Medicine.

To expand the organ donor pool, physicians in the United States have begun transplanting kidneys and livers from hepatitis C-infected donors into HCV-negative recipients who are treated with direct-acting antivirals, or DAAs. Infectious Disease News asked Christine M. Durand, MD, assistant professor of medicine and oncology and a transplant infectious diseases specialist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, about the ethics of giving someone an infection they did not already have. Durand helped launch the EXPANDER trial at Johns Hopkins, a small study of 10 HCV-negative patients who received HCV-positive kidneys.

In July 1988, the first issue of Infectious Disease News was published (Figure 1, that’s right, I kept it all these years), with Dr. Ted Eickhoff as the Chief Medical Editor. Virtually all adult and pediatric infectious disease specialists received it at no cost. And although unsolicited publications (freebies) are often mostly a glorified collection of advertisements, IDN seemed different, with meaningful, well-written pieces, by very reputable experts, supplemented by high-quality pictures on glossy paper. It took the reputation of Dr. Eickhoff to recruit leading experts to contribute and his academic leadership to ensure overall quality.

The number of liver transplantations due to hepatitis C-related decompensated cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma declined rapidly over the last 3 years while posttransplant survival has improved, according to data from the European Liver Transplant Registry .