Zinc supplementation enhances the response to interferon therapy in patients with chronic hepatitis C

August 29, 2001

Journal of Viral Hepatitis 8 (5), 367-371

Zinc supplementation enhances the response to interferon therapy in

patients with chronic hepatitis C

Takagi, Nagamine, Abe, Takayama, Sato, Otsuka, Kakizaki, Hashimoto,

Matsumoto, Kojima, Takezawa, Suzuki, Sato and Mori

1 The First Department of Internal Medicine, Gunma University School

of Medicine, Maebashi, Gunma, Japan2 Department of Nursing, Gunma

University, Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Science, Maebashi, Gunma,

Japan3 Department of Laboratory Science, Gunma University, Faculty of

Medicine, School of Health Science, Maebashi, Gunma, Japan4 Vice President

of Iwate Medical University, Morioka, Japan

We evaluated the synergistic effect of zinc supplementation on the

response to interferon (IFN) therapy in patients with intractable chronic

hepatitis C in a pilot study using natural IFN-a with or without zinc. No

clinical differences were observed between patients treated with IFN alone

(n=40) and IFN with polaprezinc (IFN + Zn, n=35). All patients were positive

for HCV genotype Ib and had more than 105 copies of the virus/mL serum. Ten

million units of natural IFN-a was administered daily for 4 weeks followed

by the same dose every other day for 20 weeks. In the IFN + Zn group,

patients received an additional dose of 150 mg/day polaprezinc orally

throughout the 24-week IFN course. No additional side-effects of polaprezinc

were noted but four out of 40 IFN alone treatment and three out of 35 IFN +

Zn group withdrew because of side-effects. Complete response (CR) was

defined as negative HCV RNA in the serum on PCR and normal aminotransferase

level 6 months after therapy. Incomplete response (IR) was normal liver

enzyme and positive serum HCV RNA. Both of them were evaluated at the 6

months after the completion of the treatment. Patients with higher levels of

serum HCV (more than 5 × 105 copies/mL) had little response in both

treatment groups. Patients with moderate amount of HCV (105 to 4.99 ×

105/mL) showed high response rates in combination group (CR: 11/27, 40.7%;

CR + IR 15/27, 64.3%), better than IFN alone (CR: 2/15, 18.2%; CR + IR:

2/15, 18.2%). Serum zinc levels were higher in patients with IFN + Zn group

than in the IFN group. Our results indicate that zinc supplementation

enhances the response to interferon therapy in patients with intractable

chronic hepatitis C.

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August 29, 2001