Conventional Interferon Alpha Therapy of Chronic Hepatitis C in Patients with End Stage Renal Disease, Six versus Twelve Months? A Meta-Analysis

Background and Aims: Too many small studies have attempted to evaluate the efficacy of standard interferon (IFN) in hemodialysis patients, however, their findings are heterogeneous and absolute guideline for therapy still remains unclear. In current review, we aim to determine which of 24 or 48 week of treatment has greater value in treatment of end stage renal disease in pre-transplantation patients.Methods: We required that studies report HCV RNA results at least 6 months after treatment cessation. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals (CI) of SVRs were calculated using the approximate normal distribution model. 95% CI of pooled SVR was computed by random effects models. Data manipulation and statistical analyses were undertaken using STATA 8.0.Results: The pooled SVR for 24 and 48 weeks of standard IFN monotherapy was 38.2% (95% CI=28.9%-47.5%) and 36.9% (95% CI=24.3%-49.4%), respectively. Pooled dropout rate was 24.2% (95% CI=9.5%-38.9%) and 26.9% (95% CI=10.6%-43.3%) in 24 and 48 weeks of IFN monotherapy, respectively.Conclusions: Standard IFN is still the drug of choice in treatment of HCV in dialysis individuals and 6 months seems to be equal to one-year duration of therapy.