Safety Status of Interferon-free All-oral Direct-acting Antiviral Agents (DAAs) to treat HCV patients in Tertiary Care Hospital of Faisalabad-Pakistan
Author(s) : Naveed Munir, Hassan Akhtar Bajwa, Muhammad Mohsin Aftab, Amna Bibi, Zahed Mahmood, Muhammad Shoukat, Muhammad Zahid Mustafa & Shahzada Khurram Syed
Abstract:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.52587/njhms.v3i2.26Objective: Current research work was planned to investigate the medication-related side effects and cytotoxic and bone marrow suppressive effects of DAAs to provide evidence-based findings to convince the local population of HCV infection treatment.
Material and Methods: Present research investigated the appearance of medication-related side effects both in males (n=200) and females (n=200) by conducting in-depth interviews with hepatitis C patients and collecting blood samples for measuring selected haemato-biochemical parameters at DHQ Hospital, Faisalabad and Samnabad General Hospital, Faisalabad-Pakistan. Further, grouping was done based on age (below 40 years and above 40 years of old) and regime combination as double regime (SOF + Daclatasvir) and triple regime (SOF + Ribavirin + Daclatasvir).
Results: It was reported that headache, fever, body aches, joint pain, heartburn, tension, aggressive behaviour, weakness and abdominal pain are among the general side effects that appeared in HCV patients on oral medications. However, the results explored that patients taking oral medication did not have vomiting, insomnia, nausea, the feeling of chill, blurred vision and tiredness-like side effects, which might imbalance the socioeconomic life of an individual. Further, cytotoxic and bone marrow suppressive effects are non-significant (p>0.05) evaluated by selected blood tests, including ALT, Haemoglobin, Neutrophils percentage, Total leucocytes count, and platelets count in comparison with a control group.
Conclusion: It could be concluded that all oral direct acting antiviral therapy is safe and effective compared to previously used therapies. Moreover, physical factors reported in patients could be minimized by improving the socioeconomic status of the local population in Pakistan.
Keywords: Hepatitis C treatment, direct-acting antivirals agents, interferon-free, safety profile