TOPIC:

Big fingers.
Small letters.
Bumpy flight.
Bad eyes.
But not tipsy!
m

Hey m! Maybe it's jet "leg"

MK

Nope.
62 year old eyes and a misspent yewth...
m

Hi folks,

Here are the latest results from Oor Wullie, who drank alcohol (moderately) both during after his treatment. Here, "moderately" means 2 or 3 units per day, so Wullie is still in the good part of the curve according to Dr James' post at the top of this thread.

Well, as the Doc says, this is not advised for advanced liver disease (F3/F4), but Wullie was only F0/F1 so he stubbornly stuck with it for the sake of science. Now he is 16 weeks post treatment, and very happy to be continuing with the experiment

Date	AST	ALT	GGT	Lipase	V-Load	Comment
10-nov-15	82	133	52	135	1.9M	Started FixHepC Sof+Dac
01-dec-15	47	63	46	74
10-dec-15	47	58	44		< 15	Crivvens! Its wurkin!
03-feb-16	30	26	30	105	UND	EOT - Sléinte!!
08-mar-16	32	28	24	116	UND	EOT+4 - Feeling great!
26-may-16	26	22	24	100	UND	EOT+16 - Still improving!

As you can see, despite the booze, Wullie's enzyme levels are still trending downwards after EOT, and so it looks like his liver is still going through a process of recovery and re-building, now that he is finally free of that bastard virus. He probably just needs to cut out the French fries to work on those lipase levels.

Anyway, all results posted here have been uploaded to GP2U in case it might help Dr James' next presentation at EASL 2017 in Amsterdam. Let's hope that next time, he will be reporting results not for hundreds, but for 10s of thousands...

Cheers,

Good for you Wullie. Your results are somewhat similar to mine
after 12 weeks. EOT is 9 more days for me....20 weeks less one
pill.Similar format will be posted for viewing including lab results.

My beer log has been kept since 02.Feb.16. Everyone is different.
Moderation is a by product of self control...believing in yourself.

Trusting one's self is a rare trait when it comes to any addictive
substance....cigarettes being the worst in the long run, IMO.

v...SVR forever, bud (friend not the beer ).....e.

"As you can see, despite the booze, Wullie's enzyme levels are still trending downwards after EOT, and so it looks like his liver is still going through a process of recovery and re-building, now that he is finally free of that bastard virus."

We used to joke about mates doing their liver in with the grog. The booze has nothing on HCV for buggering up the liver it appears. In hindsight, HCV is a much use as the plague - not that I would ever think I was bitter about its company with me.


Jeff

Warning for those with Cirrhosis

I came across this study in my reading and thought it was worth including here for those of us with cirrhosis. It's a fairly small study and probably retrospective so I'm not sure if the study cohort was truly randomly selected. Of interest is the reasonably low (15g per day) average alcohol intake in those who drank.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27180899


Early days but it should serve as a note of caution, to quote part of the lay summary:

Patients with HCV-related cirrhosis should be strongly advised against any alcohol intake.

The rest of you can probably recharge your glasses now.

"I am still on the cautious side and am doing a reasonable job of having the least booze as possible. Managed to get used to having a few lights every fortnight maybe; although I did like a bit of Red - maybe a glass next time at a restaurant."

Quoting myself from some time back in this thread, but mainly responding to Gaj's post above.

I did get round to having that glass (a rather large and full one) of red. Felt the difference and the main difference would be the alcohol content. Not feeling terrible, but feeling if I would have had more I might have.

Perhaps it is better that I am used to life sans too much booze, and I try not to tempt fate too much. No more Red - just another loss suppose.


Yours


Jeff

I wasn't too impressed when I found it either Jeff!

The other thing to bear in mind is that only 65% of people get improvement in fibrosis staging after SVR with the remainder split fairly evenly between no change and a deterioration. Drinking probably isn't going to help in this equation.

We're so used to hearing about people with cirrhosis etc, it's easy to forget that F0 and F1 is not no fibrosis. Compared to the general this is significant fibrosis of the liver. And the recommendations for safe alcohol use (21 units for men, 14 for women) are for the general population, not for people with liver disease, I assume.

If one can truly restrict one's consumption to a glass of wine occasionally, fine, but anything more is gambling with one's health in my opinion.

I think it's good to have this discussion, but it needs to be a balanced thread. A newcomer may very well read this and think it's OK to drink alcohol on/soon after treatment. And that person may be struggling with addiction/early recovery, which changes the whole context of the debate.

This is what the HepC Trust in the UK has to say on the topic.

rememberdecember wrote: I think it's good to have this discussion, but it needs to be a balanced thread. A newcomer may very well read this and think it's OK to drink alcohol on/soon after treatment. And that person may be struggling with addiction/early recovery, which changes the whole context of the debate.

This is what the HepC Trust in the UK has to say on the topic.

Hi rememberdecember,

Everyone knows (I hope) that it is absolutely not a good idea to drink alcohol if you have hepatitis C. This most definitely includes me. I have consumed alcohol for most of my life. I have probably had hepatitis C for most of my life. It was not a good combination. My problem was, I was fully aware of the first one. I did not know until last year about the second one.

So I am posting about my alcohol consumption mainly to make the point that the bug is worse than the booze.

Another reason is to try to de-fuse the idea alcohol consumption should be a criterion for denying treatment. This was often the case for several US insurers (and still is the case for some). Depending on one's doctor, this may still be the case in some national health services like the UK.

If anyone has a problem with alcohol addiction, fixing the virus might very well be easier than fixing the addiction. Its just one or two pills a day with almost no side effects. In this context, getting rid of the virus should be the first step towards better health.

So my advice to anyone suffering from booze+HepC, or any doctor thinking about treatment options, is to hit the big one first.

I didn't ever think that I was taking a gamble, but of course everyone should make their own decision based on what they know and how they feel. I'm just really glad that Dr James gave me the opportunity to knock out big one.

Here's to sensible doctoring (cheers),

it's easy to forget that F0 and F1 is not no fibrosis. Compared to the general this is significant fibrosis of the liver.

From my reading I believe that F0 does represent no fibrosis and F1 is mild fibrosis. Fibrosis implies some level of liver damage which ranges from very minor through to extreme and can occur in many ways other than just via hepatitis or excess alcohol consumption. Here is some further information regarding the general population which would seem to indicate that most people have some level of fibrosis.

"Between 90–95% of healthy people without liver disease will have a liver scarring measurement less then 7.0 kPa (median is 5.3 kPa)."

hepatitiscnewdrugresearch.com/fibroscan-...he-scoring-card.html

So most of the adult population sit somewhere in the F0-F1 range but I do agree that those who currently have HCV would be well advised to not drink and those who have achieved SVR need to be particularly mindful of their consumption in line with their fibrosis level.