Eliot
Godofsky, Nezam H. Afdhal, Vinod Rustgi,
Lawton Shick, Lael Duncan,
Xiao-Jian Zhou, George Chao,
Christopher Fang, Barbara Fielman, Maureen Myers,
Nathaniel Brown
Background
Current therapy for hepatitis C has many
side effects and induces a sustained virologic
response in fewer than half of patients infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV)
genotype 1, the most common genotype (60-70% of patients) in the USA, Europe
and Japan. It isw expected that there will be 800,00
cases of end stage liver disease in the
Aim
To report the first clinical data for NM283 in humans.
Methods
A phase I/II dose escalation trial is investigating NM283 in the range 50-800 mg/day. Subjects are treatment-naïve or experienced adults with HCV-1 associated chronic hepatitis C, with baseline serum HCV RNA >5 log10. For each dose, 12-patient cohorts are randomized 10:2 to receive NM283 or placebo for 15 days with 14 days of follow-up.
All patients were genotype 1 of whom 87% were prior interferon non-responders. No cirrhotic patients were enrolled.
Results
Dosing cohorts of 50, 100, 200,400 and 800 mg/day, involving 68 patients, have been completed with once-daily oral dosing. Dose-related decreases in serum HCV RNA at Day 16 were observed, ranging from a mean 0.15 log10 at the lowest dose (50 mg/day) to 0.73 log10 at 400 mg/twice daily with a subset of patients receiving the 400 mg/twice daily. Tolerance of study treatment has been satisfactory, with no serious adverse events, dose-limiting toxicities, or pattern of laboratory abnormalities. At 400 mg/day, some NM283-treated patients experienced transient mild nausea (5/10) or vomiting (2/10) on Day 1, but all patients completed treatment without modification. NM283 is well-absorbed, with dose-proportional plasma exposure.
Conclusions
NM283 exhibits consistent antiviral activity with satisfactory tolerance and linear pharmacokinetics in HCV-1 infected chronic hepatitis C patients. Further investigations studies are expected to examine the side effects and in combination with pegylated interferon. Expanded testing of NM283, alone and in combination with peg-interferon, is anticipated.
Mark Mailliard, Matthew Hrnicek, Mary Capadano, Richard Gilroy, James Gulizia,
John Gollan
Background and Methods
Between March, 2000 and June, 2001, at
least 95 adults acquired chronic infection with genotype 3a hepatitis C
(HCV-3a) in an oncology clinic in
Results
The mean age of our HCV-3a cohort at infection was 58.1 years (range: 19-87), 100% Caucasians, and with slightly more women. The most common malignant diagnoses were colorectal (11) or breast (10) cancer and non-Hodgkins lymphoma (6). Symptoms had occurred in 18% of patients. Liver histology was available for 30 of the HCV-3a patients. The inflammation grade, fibrosis stage, and steatosis grade and distribution were determined. Grade 1 or 2 inflammation was observed in 88%; no patient had severe inflammation. Ten patients (33%) had steatosis present in greater than 30% of hepatocytes. Eight patients (25%) had stage 3 or 4 fibrosis in liver biopsy specimens obtained within two years of HCV-3a acquisition. Of nine patients with clinical evidence of portal hypertension or histologically advanced fibrosis, only one had evidence of a co-factor that predicted liver disease (iron overload). One HCV-3a patient died awaiting liver transplantation. Only one HCV-3a patient has died from pre-existing malignancy (metastatic adenocarcinoma of the prostate).
Twenty-two patients received interferon plus ribavirin treatment. Nineteen of the 20 patients who complete treatment achieved a sustained virological response. Forty-five percent of the treated patients required growth factors or dose reductions.
Conclusions
The high rate of chronic infection, relative lack of HCV antibody and advanced liver injury indicate that co-factors exist in this HCV-3a cohort that lead to susceptibility to chronicity, atypical immune reponse and rapid progression of fibrosis. In addition to older age; immunosuppression, concurrent malignancy and its associated chemotherapy are potential co-factors that may accelerate the progression of chronic HCV infection.
In addition the authors further noted:
Ø They could not identify cancer therapy as a subset to disease progression
Ø They could not predict liver disease progression based on lab values ( blood tests)
Ø
They could not really identify
a co-factor for disease progression, but the authors suggested that it might be
chemo therapy related.
Sanaa M. Kamal, Qi
He, Alaa Ismail, Khalifa El Sayed, Sherif Ibrahim, Jens W. Rasenack, Margaret J. Koziel
Background/Objectives
The striking feature of hepatitis C (HCV) infection is its high tendency to chronicity. HCV chronic infection is characterized by low or undetectable cellular immune responses against HCV antigens, however the exact mechanism responsible for such alteration is not known. Dendritic cells (DCs) are efficient type of cells involved in antigen presentation (APC) and are capable of inducing a primary immune response. However, dendritic cells are prime targets of persistent viruses such as HCV. We hypothesized that impairment of DC functions during the acute hepatitis C may contribute to viral persistence.
Patients/
Methods
Peripheral blood DCs purifaction (magnatic sorting and positive selection), phenotypic analysis, allogeneic stimulatory capacity of DC (S.I.) as well as HCV-specific CD4+ T-cell & cytotoxic responses (ELISpot), cytokine production (IL-12, IL-10) and detection of HCV genomic sequences in DCs (RT-PCR) were prospectively assessed in 28 patients (all genotype 4)with proven acute hepatitis C and the results were correlated to the outcome of acute hepatitis.
Results
During acute infection, HCV DCs from HCV infected subjects with chronic evolution (n=21) showed significantly less allostimulatory function as their ability to stimulate proliferation of allogeneic T cells was significantly impaired compared to subjects with spontaneous resolution (n=4;P = 0.001). HCV-DCs also showed less antigen capture capacity but normal morphology and phenotype. HCV sequences were detected in DC cultures from 17/21 subjects with chronic evolution. The same pattern of impaired proliferation was observed in in the form of absent or weak HCV specific CD4+ and cytotoxic CD8+ responses (CTL) were detected in subjects with chronic evolution. In subjects who achieved spontaneous viral clearance, restoration of the allostimulatory function of DCs coincided with the absence of HCV viremia and strong multi-specific HCV specific CD4+Th-1 (IL-12) cell response were maintained. Viral clearance correlated with the DC stimulatory capacity and HCV-specific CD4+ and CD8+ responses.
Conclusion
These results indicate that chronic infection by HCV is associated with an allostimulatory defect of peripheral blood dendritic cells leading to inefficient HCV-specific CD4+ and CD8+-T cell responses. There was no big differences between the two types of dendrtic cellsw. These findings have important implications for novel immunotherapeutic strategies.
Joseph
J. Y. Sung, Henry L. Y. Chan, Alex Y. Hui, Vincent W.
S. Wong, Choong-Tsek Liew,
Angel M. L. Chim, Francis K. L. Chan, Lawrence C. T.
Hung, Yuk-Tong Lee, Nancy W. Y. Leung
Background
Treatment of chronic hepatitis B infection is far from ideal and previous studies combining conventional interferon with lamivudine yielded conflicting results.
Aim
This prospective randomized study set to evaluate the efficacy and safety of peginterferon alfa-2b and lamivudine combination for chronic hepatitis B infection.
Methods
HBeAg-positive treatment-naive patients
were randomized to receive either a combination of 32-week peginterferon
alfa-2b (1.5mcg/kg/wk, max 100mcg) first than
and 52-week lamivudine (100mg daily) or 52-week lamivudine (100mg)
monotherapy alone. HBV DNA levels (measured by TaqMan
real-time PCR assay), HBeAg status, HBV genotype, drug resistant mutant (
Results
100 patients were randomized into the 2 treatment groups (50 each). Sustained virological response was significantly higher in combination therapy than lamivudine monotherapy (36% vs 14%, p=0.03, adjusted odds ratio=3.74, 95% CI 1.14-12.29). At the end of treatment, patients received combination therapy had a higher rate of virological response (60% vs 28%, p=0.003), had more substantial reduction of log10 HBV DNA (3.91 vs 2.83, p<0.001) and were less likely to have lamivudine resistant mutant (21% vs 40% p=0.045) than those who received lamivudine monotherapy. The median reduction in necro-inflammatory score in the combination group and lamivudine monotherapy group were 2 and 3 respectively (p=0.21). There was no significant change in the median fibrosis score in the two treatment groups.
Conclusions
In patients with HBeAg-positive chronic hepatitis B infection, combination of peginterferon alfa-2b and lamivudine yielded significantly better results than lamivudine monotherapy.
Editors note:
Unfortunately, there was no study arm for pegylated interferon mono-therapy. Since lamivudine has a high incidence of drug resistance it may not provide an additional treatment benefit over pegylated interferon alone considering the risk of developing lamivudine resistance virus.