The National Institutes of Health has launched a clinical trial to analyze whether primary care physicians and similar healthcare providers can use a new antiviral therapy as effectively as specialist physicians to treat people with hepatitis C.
To compare the efficiency of treatment between different types of physicians, researchers plan to enroll roughly 600 Washington D.C. clinic patients with hepatitis C infections or hepatitis C and HIV co-infections in the trial.
Of the enrollees, about 350 participants will continue treatment with their current specialist, and 250 participants will be assigned to a primary care physician, physician assistant or nurse practitioner for treatment.
Both groups of patients will receive the same doses of hepatitis C virus treatment for two to six months, and all participants will be monitored over a 10-year period for short-term and long-term treatment outcomes.
In addition to determining whether healthcare provider type influences outcomes, the researchers will also study the safety of the drug, how well it is tolerated and whether there are differences in outcomes for people infected with both hepatitis C and HIV compared with those with hepatitis C alone.
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