Prolonged treatment (one year) of histologically advanced chronic hepatitis C with recombinant interferon alpha

Standard recombinant interferon α (rIFN-α) therapy induces a sustained ALT normalization in 15% to 25% of patients with chronic hepatitis C. In cirrhotic patients this rate of response is still lower. We evaluated if a longer duration of treatment (12 months) might increase this disappointing response rate and if the clinical characteristics of patients could differentiate responders from nonresponders in a population where liver cirrhosis was prevalent. At the end-of-treatment period, the rate of ALT normalization was 29%. After 12 months of a follow-up period, only 10% of treated patients had normal ALT and, among cirrhotic patients, this value fell to 4.1%. Only initial low γ-glutamyltranspeptidase levels (GGT) were associated with response to IFN treatment. Our results indicate that a prolonged course of rIFN-α is not able to increase the rate of durable response to IFN in patients with advanced chronic hepatitis C.