New HIV Drug Combo Better than Usual Treatment

A new drug combo had good results in treatment-naïve women with HIV, researchers reported today at IDWeek 2016 in New Orleans, LA.

Debbie Hagins, MD, an investigator for ViiV Healthcare, and colleagues said that a fixed dose combination of dolutegravir/abacavir/and showed “good tolerability and a high barrier to resistance.”

Their study is known as ARIA, an international open-label comparison of the new combo vs. atazanavir plus disoproxil fumarate/emtricitabine.

In all 495 women were randomized and treated.

Their median age was 37, and about half were white and half of African heritage.

The new combo was superior to the comparison product with 82% of women who got the new drug achieving HIV-1 RNA of less than 50 c/mL compared to 71% on the older regimen.

That applied across race subgroups and the new drug had fewer drug-related adverse events, the researchers said.

They concluded the new combo ”demonstrated superior efficacy and a favorable safety ‘ compared to the older drug combo in treatment naïve women after 48 weeks of treatment.