Early Changes in HCV Viral Load During the First 24 Hours of Treatment Exhibit a Very High Negative Predictive Value of Sustained Virological Response in HCV/HIV Coinfected Patients

NATALIA LAUFER; FEDERICO BOLCIC; EUGENIA SOCIAS; MERCEDES CABRINI; MARÍA JOSÉ ROLÓN; RITA REYNOSO; NILDA SCHVACHSA; HÉCTOR PÉREZ; HORACIO SALOMÓN; PEDRO CAHN; JORGE QUARLERI

San Francisco, Estados Unidos

Conferencia; 49th Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy; 2009

American Society for Microbiology

Background: Treatment with Peg-interferon and ribavirin (PEG-INF/RBV) for HIV/HCV patients has suboptimal rates of response, with up to 60% of them failing to respond. Virologic response kinetics has emerged as the best prognosis factor of treatment outcome. We have previously reported the correlation of early changes in HCV viral load (HCVVL) and RVR and EVR. The aim of this study was to evaluate if HCVVL decay during the first 24 hours predicts treatment outcome. Methods: Twenty HIV/HCV-coinfected patients on treatment with PEG-INF/RBV, had blood drawn at baseline, 24 h, 4, 12, 24, 48, and 72 wks. HCVVL (Bayer VERSANT HCV RNA 3.0 Assay) and HCV (Cobas Amplicor HCV 2.0) were evaluated at each time point. Statistical analysis: One way ANOVA and ROC curves. Results: Nineteen patients were on HAART, LT-CD4: 545 cell/ml (SD 287), 17 males. Metavir F4-F3: 50%. Genotype 1: 74%. HCVVL decay at 24 h was statistically significantly higher (p 0.00) among responder patients (1.6 log +/- 0.2) than among those who do not respond (0.5 +/- 0.4).A decay