The outcomes of glucose abnormalities in pre-diabetic chronic hepatitis C patients receiving peginterferon plus ribavirin therapy.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Pre-diabetes is a risk factor for type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) development. This study aimed to elucidate the impact of treatment response on sequential changes in glucose abnormalities in pre-diabetic chronic hepatitis C (CHC) patients.

METHODS

Chronic Hepatitis C patients with a baseline haemoglobin A1C (A1C) range 5.7-6.4% who achieved 80/80/80 adherence were prospectively recruited. All patients received current peginterferon-based recommendations. The primary outcome measurement was their A1C level at the end of follow-up (EOF). The interaction between variants of the IL28B gene and outcomes of glucose metabolism was also measured.

RESULTS

A total of 181 consecutive CHC patients were enrolled. The mean A1C at EOF was 5.82 ± 0.41%, which was significantly lower than the baseline level (5.93 ± 0.21%, P < 0.001). At EOF, 63 (34.8%) patients became normoglycaemic, whereas 10 (5.5%) patients developed DM. The sustained virological response (SVR) rates of 63 normoglycaemics, 108 pre-diabetics and 10 diabetic patients at the EOF were 92.1%, 84.3% and 50% respectively (normoglycaemics vs. diabetics P = 0.003; pre-diabetics vs. diabetics P = 0.02). Achievement of an SVR was the only predictive factor associated with normoglycaemia development at EOF by multivariate logistic regression analysis (Odds ratio = 2.6, P = 0.04). The prevalence of the interleukin 28B rs8099917 TT variant in patients who developed DM (70.0%) at EOF tended to be lower than that in patients with pre-diabetics (87.0%) or normoglycaemics (92.1%).

CONCLUSION

Successful eradication of HCV improves glucose abnormalities in pre-diabetic CHC patients.