O-8 CHARACTERIZATION AND EPIDEMIOLOGICAL CHANGES OF PATIENTS WITH HEPATITIS C VIRUS TREATED IN THE CHILEAN PUBLIC HEALTH SYSTEM FROM 2016 TO 2021.

Abstract

Introduction and Objectives: International studies have described an epidemiological change in patients with the hepatitis C virus (HCV), with greater involvement of young people and risk groups. The reality in Latin America, particularly in Chile, is unknown. This study aimed to epidemiologically characterize HCV patients treated in the Chilean public health system (period 2016-2021) and compare these characteristics in two periods (2016 - 2019 vs. 2020 - 2021). Materials and Methods: Historical cohort was constructed based on national data and the Hospital del Salvador registry (Santiago, Chile) (n=410). All patients diagnosed with HCV treated in the Chilean public system (2016-2019) and those treated at Hospital del Salvador (2020-2021 period) were included. It was registered: year of diagnosis, age, sex, presence of cirrhosis, HCV genotype, co-infection with hepatitis B virus (HBV) and/or HIV, need for a liver transplant, or intratreatment dead. Both periods were compared using the Mann-Whitney U test or Fisher's exact test, as appropriate. Results: 61.2% of patients were male, with a median age of 57 years. 73.5% presented genotype 1 and 11.6% genotype 4. There was a 19.3% coinfection with HIV. Only 1.4% had therapy failure at 24 weeks and 5.2% of patients underwent liver transplantation. When comparing the periods 2016 – 2019 vs. 2020 – 2021 a reduction in the median age 59 vs 49 (p<0.001) was observed, with a higher proportion of male gender 79.0% vs 51.7% (p<0.001). There is evidence of change in the proportion of the genotypes, with genotype four being the second most frequent after genotype 1. The presence of co-infection with HIV was 49.7% vs. 3.0% (p<0.001) and HBV/HIV 15.5% vs. 0.8% (p<0.001). There was no difference in the percentage of sustained viral response (Table 1). Conclusions: There is an epidemiological change in HCV patients, which suggests different routes of transmission and the need to refocus screening.