Abstract
Hepatitis C virus (HCV) causes a very common blood borne infection. According to a recent estimate, 3% of world population is infected with HCV. Acute infection develops into chronic infection that causes severe liver diseases. Major improvements in diagnosis and antiviral therapy play a crucial role in the management of chronic hepatitis infection. Better understanding of HCV life cycle introduced the development of direct acting antiviral drugs (DAA drugs). Currently, sovaldi or NS5B inhibitor is a major drug used for chronic HCV infection. New therapies are based on the combination of antiviral drugs and/or interferon free regimens. Many new DAA drugs, that are inhibitors of HCV genes, are under investigation. Serological and molecular techniques play a major role in the diagnosis and assessment of the treatment. Anti HCV detection by ELISA is an initial screening test, while nucleic acid tests (NATs) are confirmatory. Quantitative NATs have replaced the qualitative NATs. Developments in the field of diagnosis and treatment have replaced interferon based regimens with interferon free regimens.
Highlights
Chronic Hepatitis C is a notoriously widespread blood borne infection of liver that has infected about 3% of the total world population
Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is treated with Direct acting antivirals (DAAs) drugs, a protease inhibitor combined with ribavirin and pegylated interferon; it is a mixture which has increased the likelihood of response to the treatment but has showed a side effect of greater toxicity
Interferon in combination with ribavirin was the standard of care therapy for either 24 or 48 weeks than interferon alone in inducing virologic and histologic improvement
Summary
Chronic Hepatitis C is a notoriously widespread blood borne infection of liver that has infected about 3% of the total world population. High cost of treatment, increased resistance, and the higher relapse rate associated with the use of interferon treatment raised the need of an alternative therapeutic approach and the development of latest DAA drugs is a major breakthrough that will help in the eradication of HCV [8, 9]. Baseline diagnosis involves both qualitative and quantitative tests which include first serological assay to detect anti-HCV by Enzyme Linked Immunosorbant Assay (ELISA) recombinant immunoblot assay (RIBA); both are very sensitive and specific assays. Liver biopsy is recommended for the diagnosis of chronic HCV infection [10, 11]
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