Three out of five physicians caring for people with hepatitis C virus (HCV) have begun “warehousing” patients in expectation of newer therapies likely to hit the market soon. The BioTrends Research Group, which is a syndicated market research group that sells its reports to pharmaceutical companies, conducted a poll of a random sample of 50 gastroenterologists, 25 hepatologists and 25 infectious disease specialists, and came up with these findings.

When asked whether they warehoused hep C patients, 60 percent of the physicians polled said they did. In addition, one in five reported without prompting that they had begun warehousing during the past six months. This finding was in contrast to a poll taken half a year earlier, when only 5 percent of the doctors said they had begun warehousing within the previous six months.

Gilead Sciences’ juggernaut investigational agent sofosbuvir boasted the highest degree of familiarity among those surveyed, with Bristol-Myers Squibb’s daclatasvir and asunaprevir close behind. One in five of the physicians cited sofosbuvir as the most promising drug in the hep C pipeline, thanks to its apparent tolerability, oral dosing, efficacy in fighting multiple genotypes of the virus, and its potential to be part of an interferon-free regimen.

To read the BioTrends release, click here.