Benefit of direct-acting antiviral therapy for hepatitis C virus (HCV) in monoinfected and HIV-HCV-coinfected patients with mixed cryoglobulinaemia.

OBJECTIVES: Mixed cryoglobulinaemia (MC) is found in 40-60% of patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. Direct-acting antiviral (DAA) regimens considerably improve clinical outcome of HCV infection with sustained virological response rates (SVR) above 90%. We aimed to evaluate the impact of DAA therapy on cryoglobulin clearance and on MC-related symptoms in patients with HCV-associated MC. METHODS: Thirty-five HCV-monoinfected and 12 HIV-HCV-coinfected patients with symptomatic or asymptomatic MC treated with DAA regimen were analysed. Cryoglobulin levels were assessed at DAA initiation, at different time points during treatment and after treatment and until cryoglobulin clearance if any. RESULTS: Median age was 61 years and 51% (24/47) were males. HIV patients had all undetectable HIV RNA with combined antiretroviral therapy. MC was symptomatic in 77% (27/35) of HCV-monoinfected patients and in 8% (1/12) of HIV-HCV-coinfected patients (p < 0.001). Fifty-one per cent (24/47) of patients were previous non-responders to pegylated-interferon/ribavirin (PEG-IFN/RBV) therapy and 32% (15/47) were cirrhotics. One patient received DAA + PEG-IFN/RBV and all others received an IFN-free DAA regimen. The overall SVR12 rate was 100%. Cryoglobulinaemia persisted in 34% (n = 16/47) of patients at the end of follow-up: 17% (2/12) of HIV-HCV-coinfected and 40% (14/35) of HCV-monoinfected patients. Among these patients, median cryoglobulin level decreased from 101.4 mg/L at DAA treatment initiation to 51.7 mg/L at the end of follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: DAA-induced SVR allows cryoglobulin clearance in two-thirds of patients.

[Pharmacist's interventions on outpatient prescriptions in a university hospital drugs sales service]. / Interventions des pharmaciens sur les prescriptions ambulatoires dans le cadre de l'activité de rétrocession d'un centre hospitalier universitaire.

UNLABELLED: For public health reasons, some drugs are only available in hospital drugs sales service. This activity takes place in a specific risk context of organization, patients and/or drugs. A systematic prescription analysis by pharmacist contributes to securise treatment dispensed. The aim of this paper is to present the main drugs problems in the analysis of outpatient prescriptions and pharmaceutical interventions in three units of hospital drugs sales service belong to university hospital. METHODS: Throughout the year 2013, drug problems detected were recorded prospectively and systematically. RESULTS: Of the 22,279 prescriptions analyzed, 247 pharmaceutical interventions (1.1%) were detected including 27.6% of problems concerning the dosages, 15.4% the unconformity, 6.9% contraindications. Regarding ATC drugs classes, we found 43.7% for anti-infectives and 17.4% for antineoplatics. The overall acceptance rate is 81.8%. CONCLUSION: These results show the importance of the analysis of outpatient prescriptions before dispensing and the need to have all prescriptions, clinical and biological elements and to develop interprofessionality. The implementation of a platform for dematerialized data exchanges between professionals, including data from the pharmaceutical patient record should contribute to improving drug management of the patient.