Kaiser Permanente Hawai‘i hits a milestone after curing 1,000 hepatitis C patients

The Kaiser Permanente Hawaiʻi Viral Hepatitis Clinic took an unfathomable achievement and made it a remarkable milestone after officially curing 1,000 people of hepatitis.

Last week, Kaiser Permanente announced that the clinic has cured 1,000 patients of hepatitis, which highlights the clinic’s dedication to combating hepatitis C and improving patient outcomes.

“It’s a very satisfying thing to make that call and tell someone they’re cured,” said Rashmi Baragi, MD, Director of the Viral Hepatitis Clinic. “You can prevent so much damage to a patient from this infection.”

Despite the availability of drugs that can cure 95 percent of hepatitis C cases, two in three insured individuals with hepatitis C in the U.S. remain untreated within a year of diagnosis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Kaiser Permanente Hawaiʻi’s viral hepatitis clinic stands out as a model for effective hepatitis care.

“Hawaiʻi has one of the highest rates of liver cancer in the United States, and the leading causes are viral hepatitis,” said Thaddeus Pham, viral hepatitis prevention coordinator at the Hawaiʻi State Department of Health. “Given the impact of viral hepatitis on our local communities, we partner with health care organizations and community-based agencies across the state to enhance access to hepatitis services, including testing, immunizations, care coordination, and treatment.”

In the decades since Kaiser Permanente Hawaiʻi started the viral hepatitis clinic, Hawaiʻi Permanente Medical Group physicians Tarquin Collis, MD, chief of Infectious Disease, and Katie Kingsley, MD an Internal Medicine hospitalist at the clinic, have joined forces with local organizations such as Hep Free Hawaiʻi, a coalition of providers and public health leaders working together to eliminate hepatitis in the islands.

“It has been remarkable to watch a disease go from something that we didn’t understand very well, and we had terrible treatments for, to a disease that we can largely eradicate without much drama,” said Collis.

When Collis joined in 2001, he saw an opportunity to leverage resources to fight hepatitis C. The clinic was founded in 2004 with a modest budget and quickly the doubled cure rates of patients within Kaiser Permanente Hawaiʻi.

The approval of direct-acting medications such as Harvoni in late 2014 revolutionized hepatitis C treatment, increasing cure rates to 95 to 98 percent with minimal side effects.

An estimated 2 million adults in the U.S. have chronic hepatitis C, with new infections on the rise. Many patients are unaware they have the virus, as it often remains asymptomatic. Kaiser Permanente’s universal hepatitis C antibody screening and reflexive testing have accelerated the pathway for members to be cured.

Honolulu resident Paul Lance, one of the clinic’s early patients, was diagnosed with hepatitis C in 1986. After undergoing 11 months of treatment, Lance was cured.

“I consider myself very lucky that it worked,” said Lance. “The viral hepatitis clinic is helping so many people, and I’m very, very grateful to them.”

Another Honolulu resident, who chose to keep her name confidential, was celebrated as the 1,000th patient cured. She discovered she had hepatitis C during routine blood work at one of her appointments and was immediately referred to the Kaiser Permanente Hawaiʻi Viral Hepatitis Clinic.

Despite her initial concerns – the patient mentioned how being diagnosed with hepatitis C can come with a stigma – she looks back positively on her experience.

“After I met with Dr. Collis and the team, I was like, all right, let’s do this,” she said. Talking to her care team was “just like a conversation with friends.” She is thankful for her treatment and was relieved that she was able to continue working during her treatment.

Today, she has completely changed her lifestyle. “I feel like I have a second chance at life. I changed my diet, I stopped drinking. I’m all for a healthy liver.”

“One thousand patients — it feels like both a big number and a small number at the same time,” Dr. Collis said. “To me, it feels like a thousand stories and a thousand lives whose trajectories have been transformed for the better. That’s a wonderful feeling and an incredible story to tell.”