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The prospective, multicenter Hepatitis C Antiviral Long-term Treatment against Cirrhosis (HALT-C) trial showed that 3.5 years of weekly maintenance therapy with peginterferon alfa-2a did not improve outcomes in hepatitis C virus (HCV)-infected patients with advanced fibrosis (JW Gastroenterol Dec 5 2008). In that trial, 1050 patients (60% with stage 3 or 4 fibrosis; 40% with cirrhosis) were randomized, after a lead-in treatment phase, to receive either 90 µg of peginterferon or no further treatment.
Now, researchers have combined the treatment and control groups from the HALT-C trial to determine the rate of liver-disease progression from advanced fibrosis to cirrhosis during 4 years of follow-up. They also tracked clinical events — Child-Pu…