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Functional cure of chronic hepatitis B: current status and perspectives

  

  1. 1.Department of Infectious Disease, the Third Hospital of Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang 050051, China;
    2.Department of Infectious Disease, Huashan Hospital of Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China
  • Online:2016-07-05 Published:2016-07-08
  • Contact: Corresponding author: Zhang Wenhong, Email: zhangwenhong@fudan.edu.cn; Zhao Caiyan,Email: zhaocy2005@163.com

Abstract: Treatment of chronic hepatitis B (CHB) with nucleos(t)ide  analogs (NA) and interferonα (IFNα) can lead to a significant suppression of viral replication, as well as reduced risk of disease progression and hepatocellular carcinoma. However, challenge remains regarding curing CHB because hepatic covalently closed circular DNA can not be completely eradicated. Discovering new drugs targeted hepatitis B virus may enable the possibility of functional curing CHB in future. Among available therapeutic strategies, switching to or sequential combination with IFNα in patients with longterm NA treatment can induce increased percentages of responses, even make the likelihood of functional cure in a proportion of patients.

Key words: hepatitis B, chronic, antiviral agents, therapeutics, hepatitis B surface antigens