Janssen launches hep C support programme

Published on 23/02/12 at 03:00pm

Janssen has launched a hepatitis C support programme for patients in the UK to help with medicine adherence and healthy living.

It is tailored for those taking Janssen’s hep C pill Incivo (telaprevir) along with Roche’s injectable interferon treatments Pegasys and Copegus.

The MYINCIVO support programme, which was launched this week, will be run with Bupa Healthcare.

Together they will offer an SMS text dose reminder service to help with drug adherence, promote healthy eating and lifestyle to manage the disease long-term, and help patients deal with possible side effects from Incivo.

MYINCIVO comes several months after Incivo was launched in the UK for patients with genotype-1 chronic hepatitis C.

Incivo is a new type or oral protease inhibitor for the disease, and competes with Merck’s oral hep C pill Victrelis.

Both drugs are undergoing a NICE appraisal to assess whether they should be routinely funded on the NHS in England.

Dr Peter Barnes, medical director at Janssen, said: “We recognise that treatment for hep C can be challenging and demands significant commitment from patients.

“We also recognise that the addition of telaprevir, one of a new class of medicines which directly targets the hep C virus, to the current standard treatment adds another element of complexity.

“That is why today we are launching this programme to support patients 24 hours a day, seven days a week for the full duration of their treatment if they are initiated on a telaprevir based treatment regimen.”

MYINCIVO is intended to complement the care being provided by a patient’s hep C specialist doctor. Patients’ partners, carers or family members can also access the programme, where appropriate.

This programme builds on Janssen’s hep C community site http://www.HelpEveryPersonC.co.uk/, which was launched last year.

This site provides interactive map data on the prevalence of hep C by locality, details of local support groups, treatment centres and stories from people living with the disease.

Ben Adams

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