Genetic Variation in Interleukin-28B and Response to Peg-IFNα-2a/RBV Combination Therapy in Patients with Hepatitis C Virus Infection

The hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is one of the major causes of progressive liver diseases worldwide. Despite the new treatments for HCV infection, antiviral therapy with a combination of pegylated interferon-α 2a plus ribavirin (Peg-IFNα-2a/RBV) is still used in developing countries..
The aim of the current study was to determine the relationship between rs12979860 polymorphism in the interleukin 28B gene (IL28B) and response to Peg-IFNα-2a/RBV combination therapy in Azerbaijani patients with chronic HCV infection..
A total of 72 Azerbaijani patients with established chronic HCV-1b took part in this cross-sectional study between January 2010 and September 2015. Genomic DNA was extracted from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of the patients and the rs12979860 single nucleotide polymorphism was diagnosed by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism assay (PCR-RFLP)..
The mean age of the patients was 36.9 ± 12.4 (range of 27 - 57 years) and 42 (58.3%) out of 72 were male. Concerning the IL28B polymorphism in rs12979860, the results indicated the presence of CC, CT, and TT genotypes in 24 (33.3%), 42 (58.3%), and 6 (8.3%) patients, respectively. There was a significant association between IL28B genotypes and response to HCV combination therapy with peg-IFNα-2a/RBV (P = 0.001)..
The results of this study indicate that the rs12979860 CC genotype of IL28B was associated with a response to Peg-IFNα-2a/RBV combination therapy in Azerbaijani patients with HCV-1b infection. Therefore, host genetics may be useful in predicting the response to hepatitis C treatment..