Boehringer Ingelheim reports positive trial data for HCV drug

Boehringer Ingelheim has announced data from new Asia-based studies which further demonstrate the positive performance of faldaprevir in the treatment of hepatitis C virus (HCV).

Post-hoc subanalysis of the STARTVerso 1 and 2 trials – which took place in Taiwan, Korea and Japan – revealed that faldaprevir plus pegylated interferon and ribavirin was a safe and effective therapy for treatment-naive patients with genotype-1 HCV.

Both of the trialled doses of faldaprevir were associated with high viral cure rates and shorter treatment durations, with up to 95 percent of patients meeting the criteria to stop all treatment after 24 weeks.

These two studies are part of a wider global STARTVerso trial programme that includes four phase III trials with more than 2,200 patients affected by the disease.

Professor Klaus Dugi, senior vice-president for medicine at Boehringer Ingelheim, said: "These data add to the growing body of evidence for faldaprevir and reinforce the comprehensive nature of the STARTVerso clinical trial programme."

This comes after the firm reported positive phase III trial data for its new lung cancer therapy nintedanib last month.