U.S. Medical Societies Launch New Hepatitis C Treatment Guidelines

This article was reported by NAM aidsmap.

NAM aidsmap reported that on January 29, 2014, the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, the Infectious Diseases Society of America, and the International Antiviral Society-USA announced new hepatitis C treatment guidelines. The guidelines include the use of antiviral drugs that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently approved.

A panel of 27 liver disease and infectious diseases specialists and a patient advocate developed the guidelines, which reflect the latest data on screening, management, and treatment of chronic hepatitis C. The guidelines are meant for use by hepatologists; infectious disease specialists who treat persons with hepatitis C virus infection; other practitioners who may be experienced with antiviral therapy; and some who are inexperienced but may have to treat individuals who are newly diagnosed through expanded screening or show up for care because of the improved treatments.

The guidelines discuss testing and linkage to care and treatment recommendations, including recommendations for initial therapy; recommendations for specific patient groups such as individuals with HIV and HCV coinfections, patients with kidney failure, patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis, and liver transplant recipients; and treatment recommendations for previous non-responders. The guidelines do not discuss treatment costs nor do they answer the question of who should start treatment and when. The guidelines will be updated as new data become available.

The guidelines are available at www.hcvguidelines.org.

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