Hi Nick,

Sorry to hear you have the virus. On the good news side:

1. It is generally pretty simple to get rid of it
2. You are unlikely to have any lasting damage from it
3. You are unlikely to have given it to either your wife or children

In other words, don’t panic.

In terms of access to the medications (this being government/insurance) subsidised access it depends entirely on what country you are in.

If you were in Australia you could see me this afternoon, get a prescription, and probably start treatment tomorrow.

If you are in countries like the UK, USA, and Canada then treatment is available, but it is currently rationed based on all sorts of criteria, but typically you need to be at least a bit sick with the virus to get access. The downside of this is that it means young well people with Hep C are typically being forced to wait for treatment.

So, your plan A should be to see your local doctor, get the genotype, viral load and fibrosis testing done and then work out if, in your local area, you meet the local requirements for treatment.

If you don’t then a possible solution is to pay for your own treatment using self-imported generics. We do a lot of that here for patients around the world. I see patients online by video and make the correct prescription. I do need to see your blood results but the bottom line is you can get treated for under $1500 USD including all the medications and testing.

Definitely go for the “free” stuff first, but if you can’t get it that way… it can be done anyway.

Hello Kaju,

I am sure you will be reassured by the fall in ALT…

When you stop the tablets you get rid of 1/2 every day so:

1 ->1/2 of 1 = 1/2 left
2 -> 1/2 of 1/2 = 1/4 left
3 -> 1/2 of 1/4 = 1/8 left
4 -> 1/16 left
5 -> 1/32 left
6 -> 1/64 left
7 -> 1/128 left

So within a week you are down to 1% of the drugs left. 2 weeks and it is 0.01% and at 3 weeks you have only one millionth of the blood levels you had when you stopped.

Hello SHarmon,

Sorry to hear you’re results are dragging. There is a lot of anxious waiting during treatment. It should be fine.

Patient Stories looks like the right place for this thread.

Hi Balance,

I presume you are using Ribavirin. That is a pretty rapid drop. You should have another check of your blood count at rhe 3 week mark rather than 4 weeks.

Hi JohnSmith,

It’s normal to feel anxious and lost with Hep C. It’s a pretty lonely disease to have given nobody talks about it.

It’s unlikely that you have cirrhosis, however, if we keep worrying long enough and not treating you will eventually get there!

On the pragmatic side, you are also overcomplicating it and yes, you do worry too much about minute details.

The single best health intervention for someone with Hep C is to get rid of it. Then we can see what we are left with which will probably be not very much with somebody as young as you are.

I recall that you’re a big man and I’ve sent you my weight loss tips – these work really well. A patient yesterday has gone 125 kg to 65 kg over the last 8 months following the “Get enough protein and be calorie deficient and it will not only work, but it will keep working”. There’s more to it than that of course, but weight can be fixed too. It’s not as easy as the pill a day Hep C cures, but it’s not as hard as people think. I’m not much of a conspiracy theorist but it does strike me that the diet industry has a vested interest in their various wares working just enough to keep people hooked – like small jackpots from slot machines.

If you’ve had chickenpox you DO NOT need a vaccination – you’ve had the full power virus and been vaccinated with that and as a result will now be strongly immune to it (more strongly immune than you would be from the vaccine).

Google is both your friend and your foe. Without it, you probably would not have found us, but it does provide a lot of worrying information. I can assure you that almost all student doctors diagnose themselves with diseases they read about – welcome to the club of “a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing”.

Keep asking questions – the more you know the less you will worry about things that don’t require your attention. There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers.

Had just a few drinks whilst away for a few days and paid the price.

This would be one of those cases where you should listen to your body. If it’s telling you booze is bad it’s probably best to listen to that advice…

Hi Mike,

Yes we do, and always have. It’s down in the footer section.

Privacy Policy

It’s the same one we use for our Telehealth Consulting Business and follows all the rules and regs we have to abide by which is basically nothing goes nowhere.