ALPHA-INTERFERON BUT NOT BETA-INTERFERON IS USEFUL IN CHRONIC ACTIVE HEPATITIS DUE TO HEPATITIS-C VIRUS - A PROSPECTIVE, DOUBLE-BLIND, RANDOMIZED STUDY

Interferon-alpha has been widely used in chronic hepatitis C, but cont rolled studies with intramuscular interferon-beta are lacking. We ther efore performed a prospective, double-blind, randomized study comparin g intramuscular IFN-alpha and -beta in patients with chronic hepatitis C. Sixty patients were randomly assigned to receive 3 MU thrice weekl y intramuscularly of either recombinant IFN-alpha or leukocyte IFN-alp ha or fibroblast IFN-beta for six months. Nine of 20 patients (45.0%) in the recombinant IFN, 5/19 (26.3%) in the leukocyte IFN, and none in the IFN-beta group had a complete response during therapy (recombinan t IFN vs IFN-beta: P < 0.01). Only in IFN-alpha-treated patients, was infection with a single HCV genotype (type 2a or 2b) associated with s ignificantly better long-term outcome. IFN-alpha is useful in chronic hepatitis C while intramuscular IFN-beta interferon does not exert any beneficial effect. This is probably due to an insufficient bioavailab ility of IFN-beta when given intramuscularly.