I have only 3 more days left of treatment. I lost most of the feeling in my right foot below the ankle about 6-7 years ago. The numbness is now 90-95% gone. It is still lingering around the ball of the foot.
I will amend this post if it disappears completely.

Thanks for the article. With the focus on the actual virus the associated brain fog, fatigue and depression are not always given a lot of consideration despite the fact that they are very real and can have an enormous impact on all aspects of life, work and relationships.

The brain fog is one of the hardest things to explain to others. Just before my treatment I was describing it like operating with a brain full of pea soup.

Very interesting indeed SCat,
“multidrug resistant proteins” – are these the RAVS that are talked about?

As I responded slowly to the meds, but still responded (and now SVR12) this is of interest to me, could this be connected to Neurological and Cryoglobulin disorders? I had terrible back, hip and pelvic pain pre treatment, could hardly walk. Also I was losing weight and it appeared not absorbing proteins etc properly.

Blood tests flagged up very low triglycerides pre treatment. There was so little to read about low trigs. most articles focused on fatty liver and high trigs, very few articles on low ones and really had to search hard. Always in the minority me ! These tests were flagged up in a private blood test under the cholesterol section, my hospital(s) didn’t routinely test those. I always ‘knew’ there was something I didn’t quite get to the bottom of, there was some discussion on this forum re this if I remember correctly. My feeling is this kind of info could indeed be helpful pre treatment with DAAs, but it seems a very complex area and no doubt NHS patients would need to pre test privately. I also instinctively feel VitB12 may could play a part in my own case.

One of my consultants had a full-time heamotologist in their liver clinic, handy I would say !

LG

Thanks Gaj

But in this case they are saying that if the HCV virus has made its way into a patient’s central nervous system/brain and if it is replicating there, then the normal protective blocking processes of the BBB may make it harder for the DAAs to reach the virus and stop it replicating.

Hmm .well, ‘make it harder’ could amount to a similar thing, no? Maybe not in a technical sense re cause, but with the possibility of a slower response outcome?

All v interesting, if rather complex! Not sure my brain has totally returned from the fog, although much improved

Hi countless,

another question may be if it passes the blood brain barrier, is it able to cross both ways? That is reinfect the rest of the UND body?

Still think the DAAs must get into the brain because the brain fog (for me) seems to go when under treatment. Hard to tell this time round though with being re-treated as I am using Ribavirin as it has some poo-ey side effects of its own.

Last time round I did not get viral load tests done until 12 weeks after EOT so I don’t know whether the treatment failure was the virus making some heroic comeback after treatment, or had come back with a vengeance in the later stages of treatment. If after treatment, then I think if the scarring + BBB is making it harder for the DAAs to work, then even longer treatment (+ or – Ribavirn on the way through?) is indicated?

Maybe out of PBS guidelines, but then again there is generics?

yours

Jeff