Hi Dr Freeman,

I consulted with you before I began my treatment of sofosbuvir and daclatasvir for genotype 2, that I received from Greg. Anyhow, I did blood work after 10 weeks on these meds and I am happy to say I have cleared the virus. Of concern is my alkaline phosphatase went from 63 to 92. Should that be of concern?

Wow! I've learned a lot with this topic. My question was useful after all!

I've threw away everything that could infect me. I'm still mad about the knife accident and had an allergic reaction for some reason 48 hours later, that's usually a reaction I get when I'm gonna get sick with some virus, like when I got chicken pox when I was little or a flu, so I'm worried. How could I do this at the last pill day?

But at the same time, if the medicine is still effective for a week, perhaps I was protected from a possible infection by the medication?

If I've got reinfected, would treatment be the same or would the medication change?

I know he chances of reinfection in my case are almost none because of time frame, but since we're discussing this subject, I think it would be a good time to ask a couple more questions to learn more about it, so I can make sure I won't ever get this again.

I don't know if most people here know how they've got infected but I don't have the slightest clue. No drugs. No blood transfusion. Nothing. This is why I want to learn the most I can.

Hi TigerFan, Mar,

Well, Dr James is the real Medical Doctor here, but maybe I can save him some time (he will surely correct me if I am wrong).

When you get infected with HCV, the body recognises the virus as "foreign" and the immune system quickly develops antibodies against it (so an antibody test will reveal the presence of virus, but not how much of it).

But the antibodies are just the first stage in a cascade of responses which should eventually kill the infection before the infection kills you. For HCV, This all works correctly in about 1 out of 4 cases.

The problem is that, unlike many other kinds of infection, for the other 3 out of 4 cases it turns out that the HCV virus is able to hide or "lie low" for long enough that the rest of the immune system calms down before the virus is completely destroyed. But a part of the immune system stays activated, which is why we usually have only a few millions of virus per unit of blood instead of virus goo coming out of our ears, and also why some people have strange but unexplainable symptoms like skin problems etc.

So this all means that if you are re-infected with HCV, you are still stuck with the same half-functional immune response and so you will remain infected until the next treatment.

I am not sure how different genotypes come into the picture here. It must depend on which part of the viral surface that the antibody physically recognises. Probably it will be the exterior viron surface, and so the genotype of the hidden payload inside will not come into play.

Anyway, as far as I know, why this all happens with HCV and not other viruses remains a mystery. In life we are all potentially exposed to several hundred viral pathogens on a daily basis, but we successfully kill most of then stone dead in a few days.

On the other hand there are some anti-HCV vaccines in the development pipeline, so maybe in the near future it will be eventually possible to innoculate against it.

ps. sorry for long answer!

Hello tanya_aa,

You don't want to go cold turkey on the Coke/Pepsi because you're probably pretty used to being dosed with the caffeine, but the best fluid to drink is water, and the caffeine/sugar mix in Coke and Pepsi is not ideal - you get a brief hit of energy from the caffeine and sugar, then an energy slump as they start to wear off. On can a day is fine, but more than that is less than ideal...

Thanks for the information SHarmon, but no I'm not drinking Red Bull or Monster drinks, i only drink coke or pepsi, but yes been drinking lots for some reason. I did think maybe it could be that and now I'm cutting it and trying to drink more water, hope it helps i just won't to be normal again..

Please be careful with what you drink. Additives in energy drinks can lower the effectiveness of tx and really make you feel like crap as you drink more while on treatment. Red Bull and Monster are not the only soft drinks that add harmful to tx additives , MANY soft drinks now add this crap to so check the labels of everything and no Seville oranges or grapefruit (juice or the fruit) while on tx.

its now been 4 weeks and i"m still pretty much still the same. I have noticed may be a little more energy throughout the day, so thats a start i guess. Morning and night are the hardest, i wake up feeling horrible, no energy, feeling like some thing is wrong with my muscles, and at night I'm in bed at 8 8.30 sound asleep.
I haven't been drinking much water though mainly soft drinks. So as from today I'm just going to drink water and see if that makes a difference, i soon have to get a break, well i praying anyways...

It may seem strange but on Harvoni only drinking a lot of water every day fixed that for me.

I had the exact same thing appear on my leg with Harvoni into the 3rd week. It stayed for the whole treatment and took about 6 weeks after treatment ended before it started to fade. It is now a medium brown patch that no longer feels irritated or rough to the touch. I had a biopsy done and it is not cancer but after that my doctor just started throwing guesses at it. Topical steroids can permanently thin your skin so I decided to not be a guinea pig and wait it out.

I am scheduled for Oct 12 for my SRV12 blood test and that is one long wait. This one is the test that counts so a little nervous about it. Harvoni 12 weeks and not detected @ 4 weeks , 8 weeks and 12 weeks. Side effects are starting to subside , energy levels are staying at post treatment.

Hi John,

There is already a thread on this:


fixhepc.com/forum/end-of-treatment-eot/1...ion-route.html#19133


The general consensus seems to be self-reinfection is unlikely, but of course be sensible.

IOP 2015 Right 16 Left 16
IOP 2018 Right 17 Left 16

So no decrease after treatment in my case.

Hello beaches,

Please get her to email me This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and we can help arrange things for her.

In a perfect world we do all this: fixhepc.com/what-your-doctor-needs.html

If you are seeing a doctor about getting a prescription you can save yourself time, money and hassle if you bring all the things that are required.

Your doctor will need to know:

Genotype (1 to 6 with or without a and b)
Fibrosis by scan or biopsy (either as F score or kPa) or by APRI (from blood tests CBC and LFT)
Hepatitis B status
Prior Treatments - what and when
Current Medications

While you doctor can look these up (provided you know where they were done) it saves a lot of time if you have copies but if you don't have copies, don't worry.

Each of these impacts on the best choice of medications and duration.

Daclatasvir interacts with some common medications.

Routine tests pre-treatment

Full Blood Count
Liver Function
Creatinine
Electrolytes Urea
Viral Load
Hep C surface Antibody, Hep C core Antibody +/- Hep B surface Antigen (for core positive, surface negative chronic Hep B patients)
AFP (Alpha Feto Protein) - a screen for hepatocellular carcinoma

Hello Lori,

While you should have a colonoscopy sooner rather than later, the test is not very accurate in that there is only a 7% chance a positive test represents an underlying cancer, and a 27% chance it represents a "pre-cancer"

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7485003

So 93% of people with a positive test DO NOT have colon cancer and 63% do not even have a pre-cancer polyp so there is a lot of worry generated in people who have nothing to worry about.

Do take it seriously and have a colonoscopy, but the chances are that will show that you are fine.

So just a month ago took my last last pill,Epclusa for Hep C and got clean blood tests so cured Hep C,but I recently did a Colon guard test and it came back positive so now im worried that I have colon cancer or Liver cancer,has anyone ever gone through this aftyer Hep C treatment?