Hepatitis C recovery possible through medication

ISLAMABAD, Health experts have conducted a new research which claims possibility of maximum recovery from chronic hepatitis C through medication. The study will be presented in annual conference of Asia Pacific Association for Study of Liver Diseases (APASL), being held in Beijing, China in March this year. According to medical experts this is a very encouraging news for the patients who are dealing with chronic hepatitis C even after treatment with Pegylated Interferon. This study was conducted at Maroof International Hospital and Islamabad Specialists Clinic Islamabad. Prof. Muzaffar Gill who supervised the research while talking to APP acknowledged the work of Dr. Uzma Adeeb and Dr. Fatima Khattak, the research fellows who were actively involved in this research project. He said hepatitis C is a growing menace in the country and early detection of the disease and timely intervention in terms of treatment is still the burning issue. He said standard care for treatment of chronic hepatitis C is weekly injection of Peg-interferon and Ribavirin and its efficacy is 80% in population. "Unfortunately we are facing new challenges as a result of this treatment as there is 15-20% relapse rate (recurrence of diseases) even after six months of treatment with Pegylated Interferon." He said after new research findings there is a new ray of hope with newly launched Consensus Interferon (Infergen). This interferon is used in Europe and United States for the last 2-3 years for chronic Hepatitis C patients who relapse or do not respond with Peg-Interferon. Dr. Gill said "We did conduct the first ever clinical study in Pakistan to evaluate the efficacy of Consensus Interferon (Infergen) in 40 patients. These patients were treated with Peg interferon before for six months." He added after one year of the treatment, the HCVPCR, a test to detect live virus was positive in 15% of these patients. These patients were given 15 ucg of injection Infergen thrice weekly for six months and 80% of patients were HCVPCR negative which means they were free from disease, he added.