Hepatitis C infection and the risk of non-liver-related morbidity and mortality in HIV-positive persons in the Swiss HIV Cohort Study. Clinical Infectious Diseases
Kovari et al. aimed to explore the contribution of hepatitis C virus (HCV) exposure to non-liver-related morbidity and mortality, and to investigate whether successful HCV treatment reduces the risk of non-liver-related events and death by comparing HCV-viremic with successfully treated non-viremic persons, within the Swiss HIV Cohort Study (SHCS).
For the analysis, 2’503 HCV-seropositive cases and 2’503 matched HCV-seronegative controls were included. HCV treatment consisted in 90.1% of pegylated interferon plus ribavirin, and in 9.9% of a regimen containing direct acting agents DAAs (87% interferon based).
HCV-seropositive persons had an increased risk of liver disease (adjusted incidence rate ratio [IRR], 6.29), liver-related death (IRR, 8.24), kidney disease (IRR, 2.43), and osteoporosis/fracture (IRR, 1.43), compared with HCV-seronegative controls. No evidence for an increased risk in HCV-seropositive persons was found for diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, non-AIDS malignancy, and non-liver-related death. Treated patients with non-SVR vs those with SVR had a higher risk of liver events and diabetes mellitus. The increased risk for liver-related deaths disappeared after adjustment for advanced fibrosis. HCV-viremic patients compared to those with SVR had a trend for an elevated incidence of kidney disease, cardiovascular events, and non-AIDS malignancies, but this was statistically not significant.
In conclusion, HCV-exposed, HIV-infected individuals have an increased risk of kidney disease and bone-related events that does not seem to be related to persistent viral replication. In addition to a significant decrease of liver-related disease and death, therapeutic viral eradication leads to a reduction of diabetes mellitus. Prospective large-scale cohort collaborations are needed to further describe the impact of HCV eradication with direct acting agents on non-liver-related morbidity and mortality.