Robert G. Gish, MD

Realizing functional cure at scale will take more than new drugs; it requires infrastructure, testing, and patient engagement working in concert. This episode closes the series with a roadmap for that shift.

E-antigen-positive disease looks very different depending on where in the world a patient lives, shaping who stands to benefit most from emerging T-cell vaccine strategies. This episode explores that global divide.

Early signals from a TLR9 agonist point to a role for innate immune modulation, though likely as one piece of a larger combination strategy rather than a standalone cure. This episode explains why.

A newer generation of capsid assembly modulators may finally move the needle on surface antigen, something earlier compounds in this class could not achieve. This episode explores that shift.

A roughly 20% functional cure rate is meaningful, but it comes with a safety profile that demands scrutiny in patients already doing well on suppressive therapy. This episode weighs that tradeoff.

The Be Well trials narrowed eligibility to a specific surface antigen window, a design choice with real implications for which patients could benefit first. This episode reviews that rationale and its practice impact.

Bepirovirsen's antisense mechanism raises a genuinely unsettled question: how much of its effect comes from direct antiviral activity versus an unexpected immune response. This episode unpacks that debate.

Dr. Chung welcomes Dr. Robert Gish to the program, who introduces himself as medical director of the Hepatitis B Foundation, an academic appointee at UCSD, Loma Linda, and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and a clinician who sees patients with hepatitis B across five active clinic sites, where the disease makes up roughly 10% of his practice.