Real-world effectiveness and safety of glecaprevir/pibrentasvir for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C infection: data from the German Hepatitis C-Registry.

BACKGROUND: Glecaprevir/pibrentasvir is a pangenotypic direct-acting antiviral regimen approved for treating adults chronically infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV). There are limited real-world data on glecaprevir/pibrentasvir to date.

AIM: To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of glecaprevir/pibrentasvir under real-world conditions in the German Hepatitis C-Registry (DHC-R).

METHODS: The DHC-R is an ongoing, non-interventional, multicentre, prospective, observational cohort study that monitors patients with chronic HCV infection. Data were collected from patients who initiated glecaprevir/pibrentasvir and completed a screening visit on or after 2 August 2017. The primary effectiveness endpoint was sustained virological response at post-treatment Week 12 (SVR12). Safety and tolerability were also assessed.

RESULTS: As of 15 July 2018, 586 patients received glecaprevir/pibrentasvir and had documented SVR12 data, treatment discontinuation, loss to follow-up or HCV reinfection. Five hundred and fifty-two patients (94%) received on-label treatment. At baseline, most on-label patients were infected with HCV genotype 1 (53%) or 3 (33%), HCV treatment-naïve (90%), without cirrhosis (94%), and treated for 8 weeks (93%). Five hundred and thirty-four patients (96.7%) achieved SVR12 (intention-to-treat [ITT] analysis). By modified ITT analysis (excluding patients who discontinued and did not achieve SVR12 or patients lost to follow-up), the SVR12 rate was 99.4% (n/N = 534/537). There was one documented virological failure (relapse) and two documented HCV reinfections. One hundred and forty-two (26%) adverse events (AEs) and 9 (2%) serious AEs occurred; 2 (<1%) AEs led to treatment discontinuation. All patients treated off-label (N = 34) achieved SVR12.

CONCLUSION: Glecaprevir/pibrentasvir was highly effective and well tolerated under real-world conditions. Clinical trial number: DRKS00009717 (German Clinical Trials Register, DRKS).