Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Hepatol. Jan 28, 2016; 8(3): 183-190
Published online Jan 28, 2016. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v8.i3.183
Sofosbuvir treatment and hepatitis C virus infection
Masato Nakamura, Tatsuo Kanda, Yuki Haga, Reina Sasaki, Shuang Wu, Shingo Nakamoto, Shin Yasui, Makoto Arai, Fumio Imazeki, Osamu Yokosuka
Masato Nakamura, Tatsuo Kanda, Yuki Haga, Reina Sasaki, Shuang Wu, Shingo Nakamoto, Shin Yasui, Makoto Arai, Fumio Imazeki, Osamu Yokosuka, Department of Gastroenterology and Nephrology, Chiba University, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba 260-8670, Japan
Shingo Nakamoto, Department of Molecular Virology, Chiba University, Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba 260-8677, Japan
Fumio Imazeki, Safety and Health Organization, Chiba University, Chiba 263-8522, Japan
Author contributions: All authors equally contributed to this paper with conception and design of the study, literature review and analysis, drafting and critical revision and editing, and final approval of the final version.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Kanda T reports receiving lecture fees from Chugai Pharmaceutical, MSD, Tanabe-Mitsubishi, Ajinomoto, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Daiichi-Sankyo, Janssen Pharmaceutical and GlaxoSmithKline; Yokosuka O reports receiving grant support from Chugai Pharmaceutical, Bayer, MSD, Daiichi-Sankyo, Tanabe-Mitsubishi, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Gilead Sciences and Taiho Pharmaceutical. None of the other authors have any conflicts of interest or financial support to declare.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Tatsuo Kanda, MD, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Gastroenterology and Nephrology, Chiba University, Graduate School of Medicine, 1-8-1 Inohana, Chuo-ku, Chiba 260-8670, Japan. kandat-cib@umin.ac.jp
Telephone: +81-43-2262086 Fax: +81-43-2262088
Received: October 15, 2015
Peer-review started: October 16, 2015
First decision: November 24, 2015
Revised: November 27, 2015
Accepted: January 5, 2016
Article in press: January 7, 2016
Published online: January 28, 2016
Abstract

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a serious problem worldwide. The use of interferon-based therapy has made HCV eradication challenging. The recent appearance of direct-acting antiviral agents (DAAs) has changed HCV therapy. Combining the use of DAAs with peginterferon and ribavirin has improved treatment efficacy. Furthermore, the combination of different orally administered DAAs has enabled interferon-free therapy with much higher efficacy and safety. In particular, sofosbuvir, a nucleotide-based NS5B inhibitor, prevents HCV RNA synthesis by acting as a “chain terminator”. Treatment with sofosbuvir has attained an extremely high rate of sustained virologic response. The current review summarizes the efficacy and safety of sofosbuvir therapy.

Keywords: Hepatitis C virus, Interferon, Interferon-free, Genotype, Sofosbuvir

Core tip: Sofosbuvir, a nucleotide-based NS5B inhibitor, is an effective treatment against pangenotypic strains of hepatitis C virus (HCV). Sofosbuvir-containing regimens have attained extremely high rates of sustained virologic response. Because regimens including sofosbuvir result in fewer adverse events than interferon-based regimens, sofosbuvir has taken a central role in HCV treatment.