Abstract
OBJECTIVE(S): HIV/hepatitis C virus (HCV) coinfection causes accelerated liver disease compared to HCV monoinfection, and only 30-60% of HIV/HCV-coinfected individuals respond to HCV therapy with pegylated interferon and ribavirin. There are currently no biomarkers that predict treatment response in these coinfected patients. DESIGN: We investigated whether there is an association between HCV treatment response and SNPs of apoptosis-related genes during HIV/HCV coinfection. METHOD: Genomic DNA from 53 HIV/HCV-coinfected individuals was analyzed for 82 SNPs of 10 apoptosis-related genes. RESULTS: We found that the presence of the rs4242392 SNP in tumor necrosis factor receptor superfamily, member 10a (TNFRSF10A), which encodes for tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand receptor 1, predicts poor outcome to HCV therapy, in HIV/HCV-co-infected patients [odds ratio 5.91 (95% confidence interval 1.63-21.38, P = 0.007)]. CONCLUSION: The rs4242392 SNP of the tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand receptor 1 gene predicted poor interferon-based HCV treatment response in HIV/HCV-coinfected patients.