Evolution of fibrosis during HCV recurrence after liver transplantation - influence of IL-28B SNP and response to peg-IFN and ribavirin treatment

Summary The IL‐28 gene is associated with sustained viral response (SVR) after treatment with peg‐IFN and ribavirin in liver transplant recipients with chronic hepatitis C genotype 1 infection. We analysed the importance of recipient and donor IL‐28B genotype for response to treatment and fibrosis progression in 54 liver transplant recipients. Fibrosis stage (F) was defined as mild when F ≤ 2 and severe when F ≥ 3 in a liver biopsy or according to liver elasticity analysis. We found a significantly lower prevalence of IL‐28B SNP CC in the recipients (22%) than in the donors (67%), P