Treatment of Hepatitis C Infection with Direct-Acting Antiviral Agents in Liver-Transplant Patients: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Context: Recurrence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection after liver transplantation (LT) can be prevented, using antiviral therapy and new treatment regimens. Combination of protease, NS5A, and NS5B inhibitors, with or without pegylated-interferon and ribavirin (PEG-IFN/RBV), results in significantly high rates of sustained virologic response (SVR) among post-LT patients with HCV infection. In this study, we aimed to assess the efficacy of direct-acting antiviral (DAA) regimens in post-LT patients with HCV infection.
Evidence Acquisition: We conducted a systematic search in electronic databases to detect eligible studies on DAA treatments after LT. We evaluated English-language studies, including clinical trials and cohort studies, which used antiviral DAA regimens (with or without PEG-IFN/RBV) and reported SVR rates at 12 weeks after the end of treatment (SVR12). After data extraction, the pooled SVRs were calculated, using STATA version 11.
A total of 35 studies with various HCV genotypes were included in our analysis. Due to the small sample size and lack of suitable data on HCV genotypes 2 - 6, the meta-analysis was only conducted among patients with HCV genotype 1; the results of other studies were also obtained. SVR12 rates ranged from 91% to 97% in patients with 12- or 24-week sofosbuvir (SOF)/simeprevir (SMV) ± RBV, SOF/ledipasvir (LDV) ± RBV, and SOF/daclatasvir (DCV) ± RBV regimens. The minimum SVR12 rate was found in patients receiving SMV plus PEG-IFN/RBV (59%; 95% Confidence Interval, 49 - 68).
Administration of new HCV DAA regimens can prevent post-LT HCV infection. The combination of SOF/DCV and SOF/LDV, with or without RBV, for 12 or 24 weeks can produce high rates of SVR12 in post-LT HCV patients in different settings.