Real-World Clinical Practice Use of 8-Week Glecaprevir/Pibrentasvir in Treatment-Naïve Patients with Compensated...

More than 70 million people are estimated to be infected with hepatitis C virus globally. Glecaprevir/pibrentasvir is a widely used treatment and has recently been approved for an 8-week regimen for treatment-naïve patients with compensated cirrhosis in Europe and the USA, who would previously have received glecaprevir/pibrentasvir for 12 weeks. This label update was based on the EXPEDITION-8 study, which included 343 treatment-naïve patients with compensated cirrhosis. However, there is currently a lack of similarly large-scale real-world studies of the 8-week glecaprevir/pibrentasvir regimen in this population.

This summary of seven separate smaller real-world studies aims to validate the results seen in EXPEDITION-8 and provide an up-to-date real-world reference for clinicians making treatment decisions for patients with compensated cirrhosis (Child-Pugh A) who may benefit from a shorter-duration therapy with glecaprevir/pibrentasvir. The newly emerging real-world effectiveness data on treatment-naïve patients with compensated cirrhosis treated with 8 weeks of glecaprevir/pibrentasvir help to understand where further research is needed to support patients with hepatitis C virus.

Across all seven studies, glecaprevir/pibrentasvir showed high effectiveness with an average sustained virologic response rate of 98.1%, similar to that found in a clinical trial setting (99.7%). Only one patient (0.5%) experienced virologic failure and treatment was well tolerated.

Expanding the number of patients eligible for the shortened treatment duration will potentially increase treatment initiation and completion, particularly in underserved populations, contributing to the elimination of hepatitis C virus.