PHILADELPHIA — Stanley Martin Cohen, MD, medical
director of hepatology at UH Case Medical Center, Cleveland, Ohio,
discusses the high points from various speakers’ presentations during
the hepatitis C symposia at the ACG Annual Scientific Meeting, and why
now is an optimistic time for hepatitis C.
“This is an extremely exciting time for hepatitis C. We are finally
reaching a point where the medications will be essentially side
effect-free with cure rates well over 90% and this is so different than
what we’ve ever experienced before,” Cohen said.
“There’s a lot of optimism. Number one, liver biopsy may become a
thing of the past relatively soon; number two, genotype 1 is going to be
treated with all-oral therapies at cure rates well over 90% and really
approaching 100%,” he said. “Some of the other groups, the [genotypes]
2, 3, renal failure, etc., some of them have excellent therapies
already, but I think within the next year or so were going to be able to
treat and cure most of them in the over 90% range. This is a very
optimistic time for hepatitis C.”
Watch the video here... Labels: ACG, cure rates, new treatments, Side Effects