NACAH
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The mechanism of action of N-ACetylcysteine for reducing the risk of Infection in Alcoholic Hepatitis
IRAS ID
159106
Contact name
Mark Thursz
Contact email
Eudract number
2014-004522-17
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 11 months, 31 days
Research summary
Alcoholic hepatitis (AH) is the most florid form of alcoholic liver disease and portends a mortality rate of 30% at 30 days. A major cause of death in patients suffering from alcoholic hepatitis is infection. Current standard of care is Prednisolone therapy for 28 days. Recently, a large multi-centre clinical trial has shown that adjunctive N-acetylcysteine (NAC) for the first 5 days reduces the number of infections contracted by patients treated with Prednisolone. In addition, we have shown in our laboratory that the ability of a certain white blood cell, the monocyte, to fight bacteria (phagocytosis) is restored by NAC in vitro. We would therefore like to test the hypothesis that the mechanism by which NAC reduces the number of infections in AH is by restoring the ability of monocytes to kill bacteria.
REC name
London - Riverside Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/LO/0153
Date of REC Opinion
13 Feb 2015
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion