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Hepatitis C in Pregnancy: Screening and Current Treatments

  • Hepatitis C (J Ahn, Section Editor)
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Abstract

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection affects around 170 million men and women all over the world. Many patients with chronic HCV infection do not present with active symptoms until years after contracting the disease. In particular, women with quiescent HCV infection may become pregnant and deliver their child without knowing they were even infected. Thus, vertical transmission of HCV from mother to infant remains the single largest contributor to childhood HCV infection. Specific factors present before, during, or after pregnancy can increase the risk of HCV transmission from mother to infant. Some of these factors include a high viral load at the time of delivery, HIV co-infection, vaginal or perineal lacerations during delivery, and/or having a prolonged rupture of membranes. Despite these specific instances, the transmission rate from mother to infant still remains fairly low at around 1–8 %. New medications in the category of direct-acting antivirals may show promise in treating HCV in pregnant women. Many of these oral drug combinations such as sofosbuvir/ledipasvir, elbasvir/grazoprevir, and ombitasvir/paritaprevir/ritonavir/dasabuvir have been studied in pregnant animal populations but have limited to no results in human populations. The door remains open for future studies of these drugs to treat pregnant women during pregnancy that may help reduce viral loads and prevent vertical transmission of HCV infection to the infant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. LAC/USC Medical Center, 2020 Zonal Avenue, IRD 624, Los Angeles, CA, 90089, USA

    Nikhil Gupta

  2. Cedar Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, 90048, USA

    Tram Tran

Authors
  1. Nikhil Gupta
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  2. Tram Tran
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Correspondence to Nikhil Gupta.

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Dr. Nikhil Gupta and Dr. Tram Tran declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Hepatitis C

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Gupta, N., Tran, T. Hepatitis C in Pregnancy: Screening and Current Treatments. Curr Hepatology Rep 15, 280–284 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11901-016-0318-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11901-016-0318-6

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