Peri-complication diagnosis of hepatitis C infection: Risk factors and trends over time

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a common and treatable cause of cirrhosis and its complications, yet many chronically infected individuals remain undiagnosed until a late stage. We sought to identify the frequency of and risk factors for HCV diagnosis peri-complication, that is within six months of an advanced liver disease complication.

This was a retrospective cohort study of Ontario residents diagnosed with chronic HCV infection between 2003 and 2014. HCV diagnosis peri-complication was defined as the occurrence of decompensated cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma or liver transplant within ±6 months of HCV diagnosis. Multivariable logistic regression was used to identify risk factors for peri-complication diagnosis among all those diagnosed with HCV infection.

Our cohort included 39,515 patients with chronic HCV infection, of whom 4.2% (n = 1645) were diagnosed peri-complication; these represented 31.6% of the 5,202 patients who developed complications in the follow-up period. Peri-complication diagnosis became more common over the study period and was associated with increasing age among baby boomers, alcohol use, diabetes mellitus, chronic HBV co-infection and moderate to high levels of morbidity. Female sex, immigrant status, having more previous outpatient physician visits, a previous emergency department visit, a history of drug use or mental health visits were associated with reduced risk of peri-complication diagnosis.

Over a quarter of HCV-infected patients with complications were diagnosed peri-complication. This problem increased over time, suggesting a need to further expand HCV screening.