Hello Berrinice,

Yes it is a concern. There are many causes so what we need to do is work out which of them is responsible and deal with that appropriately.

I recommend a visit to your local GP for some routine bloods and to look into it further.

You don’t have details in your signature so I can’t really comment further.

We do very occasionally see people who are F4 go from compensated cirrhosis to decompensated cirrhosis on treatment initiation. This is usually easy to manage and settles, but it is a possibility that needs to be considered. Bloods and physical examination help unravel the story.

PM me with your phone number and I will give you a call.

48 hours would be fine.

No worries.

Yes, I can write scripts, and yes I am seeing patients, just booked out at the moment. Send me an email james at etc and I will fit you in somewhere.

You consultant’s advice would appear to be referencing this recent small study:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26786792

Where you can read the words “all …. svr …. regardless of duration”

However you might also read it more closely and see

ALL = 19

DURATION = 12 or 24

If they randomly divided the 58% F4s into 12 and 24 week groups we would have exactly 5 people in 1 group and 6 in the other.

If 1 F4 person had failed in the 12 week group that would have reduced the success to 80%!

GT2 is probably the easiest to treat given that Sof+Riba will get a 97% SVR rate – much higher than for GT1 or GT3.

That said you are cirrhotic so you really want to get this right the first time.

If at some point in the future a decent sized study comes out showing that F4 GT2 patients get the same results on 12 vs 24 weeks the worst case outcome is that you have taken 12 unnecessary weeks and wasted $1500 AUD.

Psychologically if you are one of the small minority that don’t SVR at least you won’t be beating yourself up for not taking 24 weeks.

If it was me I would do 24 weeks.

Hi Zhuk Congratulations on the UND……What a milestone…92 years young! Best wishes for your Mum’s progress moving forward. I do agree that the Doctors are quite hesitant with some of the elderly on doing surgery.

I’m now 3 weeks post treatment so will have my SVR4 blood test next week. Hoping for a good result..!!

Hello everyone I think I am on the right post for this. I was reading on another post to Ariels that her blood pressure was sky high., I have always had a low blood pressure reading but it is now 180/102! Scary……has been high for a little while before I started my treatment so don’t think it was that…..is high blood pressure a symptom of Hep C? I had it taken on Monday by the health assessor who comes to our work and it was 180/102…..am having my SVR4 blood test next week and will catch up with y my GP after that for results……