Hi G,

That all looks in line with expectations.

Your platelets have not changed and we don't really expect them to. Anything over 50 is enough so your good there. Your liver function has improved a bit which can be seen in the reduction in the INR (clotting time - needs liver made proteins to work properly) and fall in the ALT enzyme back into the normal range.

Things are on track. You're taking the best medication available for Hep C re-treatment namely Sofosbuvir and Maviret which are the strongest NS5B, NS5A and NS3/4A inhibitors in existence.

How are you feeling?

Hi Jerry,

Will my liver get better after my treatment?

Yes, we expect your liver to improve

Will it continue to get worse?

No, treatment stops things getting worse and allows your body to start healing

Will the progression of my liver damage slow down or can it stop?

Provided we get you cured your liver damage will stop completely.

Patients vary in how much their liver's improve but it is not at all unusual to see people move from F4 down through F3, F2 and even get to F1

The single biggest take home about treatment is in this graph:




1/4 the chance of any event, 1/3 the chance of dying, 1/5 the chance of HCC (liver cancer) and 1/10 the chance of liver failure all look like worthwhile benefits to me...

Hello Sherif,

Ledifos is a generic Harvoni made by Hetero who are one of the better generic manufacturers.

Like Harvoni it is only suitable for genotypes 1, 4, 5 and 6. It does not work well on genotypes 2 and 3.

So, while it is an effective medication, and with F2-F3 a 12 week treatment course will have about a 95% cure rate you do need to know your genotype. Do you know it?

Online pharmacies vary from outright scams, through to people supplying fake products, through to totally honest merchants. It would be a good idea to check your viral load 4 weeks into treatment - there is an 80% chance this will be undetected at this stage.

Best of luck with the treatment and keep us posted here about how things go!

Hi Sherif, welcome to the forum. As Hazel said, if you did your homework well, the drug will be licensed and authentic. However, I wouldn't be too comfortable buying from an online pharmacy that doesn't require a prescription (I understood from your post that you don't have one). How did you know that Harvoni is the right drug for you? Harvoni doesn't treat all genotypes, do you know your virus genotype? Also you should have gotten a few basic blood tests before starting treatment. It can be dangerous to start treatment without them. You really should see a doctor for a prescription before starting treatment with Harvoni, and if I were you, I would ask the pharmacy to hold the order until I get one.

Hi Jerry,
Welcome, like Mar says, I was one of the lucky ones, I had end stage cirrhosis, got treatment here and it has melted away completely. This is not common but improvement is very common- and I was F4 for 15 years, so at F3 you still have plenty of time to rebuild your liver.

You will see the general advice on lots of posts- take the meds at same time every day, with food, and drink plenty of water while on treatment. I have seen 1000's recover now, always nice to see someone about to start treatment/kill the virus. I felt way better, pretty much straight away, in a few days, but I was getting sick so the inflammation going down made a big difference, fast. For some people the improvement is more gradual.

Please check in every week or so, love to hear how you are doing.

I had a Metavir scores F2-F3 during a recent elasticity study and this made me decided to get treatment for my Hep C as 5 years ago my score was F1-F2 so my hep C is progressing. My AST and ALT numbers have been within normal range lately and I read that the most damage can be done during this stage. I don't know how long I've had the virus perhaps as early as 1988 - 1993. Do you think Generic Harvoni (Ledifos) taken for 12 weeks will rid me of the virus? I am planning on going to the doctor for progress updates but I hope to get a better price on the medicine outside of the U.S. so I just ordered the Ledifos from an online pharmacy. My question is if I am doing the right thing by ordering the drugs from an online pharmacy.

Welcome to the forum Jerry, and congratulations on starting your treatment journey soon. I'm not a doctor, but some patients who had Cirrhosis on this forum said that once the virus was eradicated, the liver finally got a chance to start healing itself. Please see this forum thread in which patients who were in your shoes (like the Hepatitis C activists Hazel and Sven) describe how their Cirrhosis was pretty much gone after being cured. So not only does the damage to the liver stop after successful treatment, the level of Cirrhosis can decrease as well.

My doctor told me I have stage F3 cirrhosis of the liver after my 1st viral load ever. I start Epclusa in just a few days but am still very worried ever since she told me about the damage to my liver. I am grateful to have a cure but this cirrhosis still worries me. Will my liver get better after my treatment? Will it continue to get worse? Will the progression of my liver damage slow down or can it stop? My doctor did not seem to be able to answer my questions but I will be taking an image of my liver for her in a few weeks. Can anyone help me with these questions? I sure look forward to feeling better and hope this all works. Thanks.

Hi EC2! It's great to hear that you are still running those marathons and enjoying your HepC free life. I'm more into climbing up things than running long distances but it feels like anything's possible again once the virus is gone.

Messages like yours are so important as they can reach people who might be thinking about getting treated but haven't quite made the leap. As we know the treatment doesn't cure all of life's problems but it certainly makes it much easier to manage them.

Best of luck for your next marathon.

Coral

Thank you for this upbeat post Seedy, it provides plenty of optimism for Hep C patients no matter how advanced their liver disease is. With the huge advance in the treatment of liver related ailments that has taken place over the last few years (e.g. Antiviral drugs), the prognosis looks excellent for the vast majority of patients.

I wouldn't go broke on lottery tickets though, your good fortune has more to do with scientific advances than pure luck

Sorry for screwing the pooch for so long ...
Harvoni did not cut it.
Started June 2018 on a combination of meds for 120 days
Vosevi and Ribavirin
Finished Oct 2018.
As of June 2019 still showing zero - so a Win in that column.
Late summer 2018 CT Scan found a tumor on my liver.
Microwave Ablation therapy May 2019
As of Sept tumor has not regrown - so a Win in that column
Beat Hep C 2018. Beat liver cancer 2019
Now going broke buying lottery tickets as I must be on one Hell of a Roll !!!
Good Luck to all in your treatments, and fingers crossed you will experience the same results as I did

An update.
Almost through month number 1 and the nausea and headaches have stopped which is great!
The one side effect that I found difficult when I did my first treatment with Viekira Pak was the slow build up of depression by the last month. I have suffered from depression since my teens and know how it feels inside and out, but that depression on Viekira was a different, dark experience that took some time to fade after I completed treatment.
I just wanted to know whether depression is a possible side effect of what I am taking at the moment as I think I can feel hints of something starting to move in that have a faint sniff of before. I'm just trying to head things off at the pass as I have 3 more months ahead of me and I will have to be prepared in order to push through if its a possibility that I'm about to be hit like last time.
My specialist has ordered bloods for the end of each month of the treatment so I will post those up if you would like me to when I receive them?
g

That's deep Dr James, I don't think Kaju was expecting this type of answer Nicely put.

Hypo = less = cyst
Hper = more = cancer

Hypo is good.

It's great to hear you can feel the difference already. These medications are good and you are taking a good one. It should all be OK, but here's the thing. On the first round of treatment 5% of people fail. That's sad, but at FixHepC we run by the mantra of the US Marine Corps - No man (or woman) left behind.

I have nearly 4000 patients. About 200 failed the first round. A few died, but everyone else we got cured the second (or in a few cases 3rd) time around.

It will be ok.

Hello Kaju,

For you, we have seen many cases of "liver enzymes" being elevated.

We call them liver enzymes but the come from muscle too.

We have seen your levels go up and down and seen your Hep C PCR remain negative.

You worry a lot. Some people do. I suggest you test for Hep B Ag and Hep C PCR and if these are negative....

Stop worrying and stop testing. You will, like all of us, die of something but it will not be the Hep B or Hep C you are worrying about.

My worry is that your worries will stop you enjoying 100% of your cure. You should enjoy this, rejoice in the magic of being cured and your cleverness of finding the cure.

This may not translate.

Life is a terminal disease and sexually transmitted at that.

Please take the tests for Hep B Ag and Hep C PCR and put your mind at rest. Once they come back negative enjoy the simple beauty of being alive, and live each day as though it may be your last - one day you will be right, but every other day you will have been wrong.

Life is a journey. It is not a trial run.

I try to live my life like this poem

I shall pass this way but once; any good that I can do or any kindness I can show to any human being; let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

- Etienne de Grellet QUAKER MISSIONARY

You may enjoy this hidden page on our website. I only share it with people I respect:

fixhepc.com/fixers

Play the videos - the last one says "a single act of caring creates an endless ripple". I strive to create those ripples. Watch it - it will move you.