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Background: Diverticular disease of the colon has a wide geographic variation and is a very common cause of hospital visits and admissions in the west. Contrary to this there is scarce data on colonoscopic prevalence of diverticular disease from our country. Aims and Objectives: To determine the prevalence of colonic diverticulosis and concomitant colonoscopic pathologies among patients undergoing colonoscopy in a tertiary care gastrointestinal endoscopy setting in Northern India. Materials and Methods: All adult patients who underwent colonoscopy for various indications and were diagnosed to have colonic diverticulosis from August 2016 to December 2019 in the Department of Gastroenterology, Shifa Medical centre, Srinagar, Kashmir, India were included in the study. Results: Out of a total of 4500 colonoscopic procedures, diverticulosis was seen in 190 cases with an overall prevalence of 4.2%. Fifty-six percent of these were males and 44% were females. In 77 (40.52%) patients diverticulosis was seen in left colon, in 72 (37.89 %) in right colon and in 41 (21.57 %) diverticulosis was noted in pancolonic distribution. Adenomatous polyps were seen in 27 % of the cases. Conclusion: Colonic diverticulosis has very low prevalence in this northern Indian state. Adenomatous polyps are commonly associated with this condition.

Introduction: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection represents a major healthcare challenge in both industrialized and developing countries. The standard treatment for hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has been interferon-based over many years with less than satisfactory cure rate and many side-effects. Directly acting antivirals (DAAs) have promise for a treatment regimen free of interferons with much better cure rate and minimal side-effects. Aims and Objectives: To evaluate efficacy and safety of an oral interferon-free regimen, sofosbuvir plus ribavirin in the treatment in genotype 3 chronic hepatitis C patients. Materials and Methods: 200 treatment naïve chronic hepatitis C genotype 3 patients of either sex with age more than 18 years were enrolled in the study. Sofosbuvir 400 mg once daily plus Ribavarin weight-based was given to all the patients. Duration of treatment was 24 weeks and 12 weeks to cirrhotics and non-cirrhotics respectively. Data analysis was performed using the IBM SPSS version 22. Results and Observations: In this prospective study the total number of patients was two hundred (n=200). The mean age (in years) of patients was 44.2 ± 14.7. The number of male patients was 112 (56 %) and 88   (44 %) were females. The number of cirrhotic patients was 70 while 130 were non-cirrhotic. On comparison on the basis of sustained virological response at twelve weeks of the completion of treatment (SVR12) we observed that treatment naïve cirrhotic patients had  SVR 12 of  92.8 %  while in the non cirrhotic patients SVR 12= was 96.9 % . Adverse effects were insignificant and none of the patients dropped out because of side effects. Conclusion: The sofosbuvir and ribavirin based therapy showed very good rates of sustained virological response in chronic hepatitis C genotype 3 patients irrespective of the state of fibrosis. In addition it was found to be cost effective, safe and very well-tolerated. Keywords: Hepatitis C; Genotype 3; directly acting antivirals, Sofosbuvir, Sutained virologic response (SVR).

To compare the efficacy of levofloxacin based and clarithromycin based sequential therapies for eradication of Helicobacter pylori infection. Methods: From january 2017 to december 2018, 260 patients with H. pylori infection randomly received 14 d of levofloxacin-based sequential therapy (LEVO-ST group, n = 130) or clarithromycin-based sequential therapy (CLA-ST group, n = 130).H.pylori infection was defined on the basis of either histologic evidence of H. pylori by modified Giemsa staining; or a positive rapid urease test by gastric mucosal biopsy. Successful eradication therapy for H.pylori infection was defined as a negative 13-Carbon-urea breath test four weeks after the end of eradication treatment.Compliance was defined as good when drug intake was at least 90%. H. Pylori eradication rates, patient compliance with drug treatment, adverse events, and factors influencing the efficacy of eradicationtherapy were evaluated. Results: The eradication rates by intention-to-treatanalysis were 89% (116/130; 95%ci: 86.2%-95.4%)in the levo-st group and 86% (112/130; 95%ci:65.8%-77.4%) in the cla-st group (p = 0.450). Theeradication rates by per-protocol analysis were 91%(114/124) 95%ci: 89.1%-98.1%) in the LEVO-ST groupand 87% (106/122; 95%ci: 69.4%-81.8%) in the CLA-ST group (p = 0.227). Compliance was 100% in bothgroups. The adverse event rates were 17.6 % (22/125) and 28.6% (35/122) in the LEVO-ST and CLA-ST group,respectively (p = 0.038). Most of the adverse eventswere mildto-moderate in intensity; there was none serious enough to cause discontinuation of treatmentin either group. Conclusion: The 14-d levofloxacin-based sequential therapy has high efficacy for H. pylori eradication effective. Moreover, it showed excellent patient compliance and safety compared to the 14-d clarithromycin-based sequential therapy.

Abstracts Objectives: Direct acting antivirals (DAAs) have dramatically changed our approach towards management of chronic hepatitis C by yielding a high sustained virological response (SVR). Genotype-3 is the most common genotype found in Kashmir (Northern India) besides having an aggressive nature with increased risk of steatosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. We assessed the efficacy and safety of sofosbuvir plus valpatasvir based therapy in chronic hepatitis C genotype-3 infection in Kashmiri population. Aims and objectives: An observational, prospective, open label, hospital based study was carried over a period of two years which included 230 treatment naïve chronic hepatitis-C genotype-3 patients. Patients were divided in two groups. Group-A: Non-cirrhotics who received sofosbuvir (400 mg daily) with valpatasvir (100 mg) in fixed–dose combination for 12 weeks. Group B included CPT class A cirrhotics who received sofosbuvir (400mg daily) with valpatasvir (100 mg daily) and weight based ribavarin for 12 weeks. The primary end point was a sustained virologic response at 12 weeks after the end of therapy. Results and observations: We observed 98.57 % (138/140) SVR 12 in non-cirrhotics who received valpatasvir plus sofosbuvir treatment regimen. Cirrhotics who received Sofosbuvir plus valpatasvir with ribavirin observed SVR of 96.6 % (87/90). All patients tolerated the drug regimens well without any serious adverse effect. Conclusion: Once daily oral Sofosbuvir plus valpatasvir based fixed dose rerimen is highly efficient and safe in treatment of both cirrhotics and non-cirrhotic hepatitis C patients. Keywords: Direct acting antivirals; sustained virological response; Genotype; chronic hepatitis C