HCMSG - Hepatitis C Mentor & Support Group, Inc.
Search
  • About Us
    • Our Mission
    • Board of Directors
    • Medical Advisors
  • Resources
    • Corona Virus
    • Hep C Facts & Stats
    • Medications and Treatments >
      • Patient Assistance Programs
    • Reading
    • Links
  • Programs/Training
    • The Circle Model >
      • THE CIRCLE Registration
      • Group and Facilitator Guide
    • Hepatitis C Online Training
    • The Hepatitis C Education and Support Group Assistance Program
    • Healthcare Provider Training
  • Newsletter
  • Blog
  • Support Us
    • Holiday 2020
  • Contact Us

Surge in Youth HCV Presents Hepatologists With Tough Choices  

12/7/2015

0 Comments

 
​
GASTROENTEROLOGY & ENDOSCOPY NEWS 
THE INDEPENDENT MONTHLY NEWSPAPER FOR GASTROENTEROLOGISTS
Last Update: December 04, 2015
Hepatology in FocuS
ISSUE: OCTOBER 2015 | VOLUME: 66:10

   
by Bridget M. Kuehn

​Recently Mark S. Sulkowski, MD, of the John Hopkins University School of Medicine, in Baltimore, saw a teenage patient who had contracted hepatitis C after starting to shoot up as a 12-year-old.

The case is but one in a spike of new infections with the hepatitis C virus (HCV) being driven largely by an epidemic of injection drug use, particularly among adolescents and young adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Sadly, with the heroin epidemic, I’m increasingly seeing teenagers in my practice,” Dr. Sulkowski said earlier this year at the inaugural midyear meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.
Although mother-to-child transmission remains the primary source of HCV infection for children, injection drug use is a common source of infection for adolescents (Clin Liver Dis 2014;5:14-16). Managing young patients is challenging for clinicians, who may not be accustomed to treating pediatric patients and who have little data to guide their treatment decisions.
“This is a patient population for whom data is lacking,” Dr. Sulkowski said.
Dr. Sulkowski said there was a nine-year gap between the publication of the first clinical trials of pegylated interferon and ribavirin in adults and similar studies in children (N Engl J Med 2002;347:975-982; Gastroenterology 2011;140:450-458). As a result, investigators were uncertain of a safe dose and whether the medications would affect growth or pose other risks to children, he said. However, eventually results suggested that the combination also worked in children.
Clinical trials of the protease inhibitors telaprevir (Incivek, Vertex) and boceprevir (Victrelis, Merck) were abandoned in children when data on the use of newer direct-acting antiviral agents in adults indicated that these drugs might provide effective and less toxic options for young patients.
Studies of direct-acting antiviral agents are underway in pediatric populations, but none has been published so far, said Maureen Jonas, MD, clinical director of the Center for Childhood Liver Disease at Boston Children’s Hospital. Pediatric trials are more complicated because appropriate doses for children of different ages and sizes must be determined, Dr. Jonas said. Children also may be unable to swallow large pills, requiring a different means of administration.
So far, Dr. Jonas said there is no reason to believe that children will not experience cure rates above 90% with 12 weeks of direct-acting antivirals, as do adults. That prospect makes the currently available drugs, which may require a yearlong regimen and only cure about half of patients, an unappealing option for pediatric patients, she said.

- See more at: http://www.gastroendonews.com/ViewArticle.aspx?d=Hepatology%2Bin%2BFocus&d_id=481&i=October+2015&i_id=1233&a_id=33817&tab=MostRead#sthash.bFWhhucw.dpuf         

-














See more at: http://www.gastroendonews.com/ViewArticle.aspx?d=Hepatology%2Bin%2BFocus&d_id=481&i=October+2015&i_id=1233&a_id=33817&tab=MostRead#sthash.bFWhhucw.dpuf
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Privacy Policy