[Acute hepatitis C: response to treatment with interferon-alpha plus ribavirin].

INTRODUCTION

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is one of the most frequent causes of chronic liver disease in our environment. Most patients who present acute HCV infection develop chronic hepatitis, and only between 15 and 30% resolve spontaneously.

PATIENTS AND METHOD: The clinical, biological and viral characteristics, as well as tolerance to treatment and level of response were retrospectively analyzed in nine patients with acute hepatitis C who underwent treatment with interferon-alpha plus ribavirin for 12 to 48 weeks.

RESULTS

The mean alanine-aminotransferase (ALT) and total bilirubin concentrations of patients at diagnosis was 1.469 U/l and 5.5 mg/dl, respectively. All the patients except one were infected with genotype 1b and presented a mean viral load of 634,924 U/ml. At the end of follow-up, in seven patients (77.7%) HCV-RNA levels were undetectable and ALT levels were normal. The therapy was well tolerated except in two patients: one presented a mild depressive syndrome that was controlled with drugs and the other presented thyroiditis, which led to treatment withdrawal at 12 weeks.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite the small number of patients, interferon alpha plus ribavirin seems to achieve a high, sustained response. The treatment was well tolerated and there were few adverse effects.