Cardiovascular Function and Ribavirin Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics in Patients With Lassa Fever

Lassa fever carries a treated mortality in hospitalized patients of up to 50%. Lassa fever is often described as being characterized by vascular leak and shock in the terminal phase, but, whilst animal data supports this, there are limited data in humans. Therefore, an aim of this study therefore is to characterize cardiovascular function in patients with Lassa fever, with the ultimate goal of informing future trials of supportive or therapeutic strategies.

Ribavirin is the current standard of care. However, the efficacy of ribavirin has not been established in a randomised controlled trial (RCT). There is very limited pharmacokinetic (PK) data on ribavirin in patients with Lassa fever and the optimal dose of ribavirin for an RCT is unknown. Furthermore, there are various hypothesized mechanisms of action of ribavirin, none of which have been investigated in humans with Lassa fever. Further aims of this study therefore are to characterize the PK of ribavirin in Lassa fever, and identify any associations between ribavirin PK parameters, viral load and markers of immune/inflammatory status.