Drug-making Company Bristol-Myers Squbb said its combination of three experimental hepatitis C medicines beat the virus in 15 out of 16 patients, according to Bloomberg.
The pill combination does not force the patient to take injections of interferon every week or take ribavrin—which can damage the liver. Instead, the new drugs hinder the virus from making duplicates of itself as opposed to treatment that simply increases the body’s ability to defend against the virus.
Drugmakers are currently looking for pills that are both feasible to take and don’t have as many side effects as regular treatment. Currently over 150 million individuals suffer from hepatitis C.
"The great news with these oral combos is that it takes less time to explain to patients how to take their medicine," head of neuroscience and virology research for Bristol-Myers Squibb, Doug Manion, said.
According to Manion, the new treatment allows patients to forego self-injection and receive treatment for a shorter amount of time.
The New York-based drug company has had some failures with hepatitis C treatment in the past. Last year the company had to stop making an experimental drug to treat the virus because some patients began to suffer from heart failure.
The three drugs used by BMS are daclatasvir, asunaprevir, and BMS-791325.
The clinical trial was done with patients who had never received treatment for the virus. Each group was given therapy combinations of the drug and different doses of BMS-791325. The clinical trials used two groups of 16 patients.
The first trial saw the virus leave 15 out of 16 paitents who were treated with a 75-milligram dose for 12 weeks. The 16th participant left before the researchers could analyze the data and call it a success, the company said.
In the second trial participants were given the same does over 24 weeks. The results saw 14 out of 16 patients restored. Two patients did not complete the trial.
Bristol-Myers did a separate trial with 150 milligrams of BMS 17935. The virus was undetectable in 16 out of 18 after 12 weeks. A separate trial done after 24 weeks showed the virus had left 15 out 16 participants.
Headaches were the most common side-effects seen in the patients. The most serious was a blood vessel constriction in the brain.
Marion said that the company does not know why results from the 150 milligram dose ere were different and that the company will run another trial to study the safety of the drug.
