@article {173,
	title = {Patient{\textquoteright}s age modifies the impact of the proposed predictors of sustained virological response in chronic hepatitis C patients treated with PEG-interferon plus ribavirin.},
	journal = {Eur J Intern Med},
	volume = {19},
	year = {2008},
	month = {2008 Jun},
	pages = {266-70},
	abstract = {BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of patient{\textquoteright}s age on the impact of typically proposed predictors of sustained virological response (SVR) in treatment-na{\"\i}ve, high-pretreatment viral load (>700.000 IU/ml), chronic hepatitis C (CHC) patients treated under real-life conditions in Greece.

METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed 185 CHC patients (14.4\% cirrhotics) who had been treated with weight-adjusted dosing (1.5 microg/kg per week) of pegylated interferon-a2b (PEG) plus genotype-based ribavirin (RIB) for 24 or 48 weeks of treatment, based on viral genotype. SVR was confirmed by undetectable serum HCV-RNA 6 months after the end of treatment.

RESULTS: Overall, 68.5\% of patients exhibited SVR and 31.5\% were non-responders (non-SVRs). Among the non-SVRs, 71.4\% were infected with HCV genotype-1. Importantly, 71.4\% of genotype 4-infected treated patients exhibited SVR. In the multivariate analyses, only the early histological stage of liver disease (p=0.015) and the presence of genotype non-1 infection (p=0.003) were independent predictors of SVR. For patients younger than 35 years, none of the baseline parameters and neither viral genotype (p=0.284) nor the stage of liver disease (p=0.351) was an independent predictor of non-SVR, whereas for patients between 35 and 55, only the presence of genotype-1 infection independently predicted non-SVR (p=0.008). For older patients (>55 years), only the histological stage of liver disease (p=0.047) and not the viral genotype (p=0.275) independently predicted non-SVR.

CONCLUSIONS: The impact of the typical predictors of SVR, such as viral genotype and liver histopathology, is modified according to patient{\textquoteright}s age in currently approved combination treatment.},
	keywords = {Adult, Age Factors, Aged, Antiviral Agents, Biopsy, Needle, Female, Forecasting, Genotype, Greece, Hepatitis C, Chronic, Humans, Interferon-alpha, Liver, Male, Middle Aged, Polyethylene Glycols, Recombinant Proteins, Retrospective Studies, Ribavirin, Treatment Outcome, Viral Load},
	issn = {1879-0828},
	doi = {10.1016/j.ejim.2007.06.014},
	author = {Elefsiniotis, Ioannis S and Pavlidis, Christos and Ketikoglou, Ioannis and Koutsounas, Sotirios and Scarmeas, Nikolaos and Pantazis, Konstantinos D and Moulakakis, Antonios and Tsianos, Epameinondas V}
}
