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Hi HepCat,
I have just finished 6 months re-treatment and understand that the virus does not want to leave us cats alone.
Second time around I found that AFP was down to 2, rather then 4, and LFT’s were all normal without the slight elevation the first time around.
Red cells and platelets were a sad storey ……..
Keep up the fight as I think the virus takes some convincing it s not welcome anymore.
yours
Jeff
14 March 2017 at 12:47 am in reply to: HCC and DAAs – Treat the HCC first for better SVR rates #25572Sven wrote:Doc – I love the anology: the cancer cells ignore the body’s apoptosis literally saying” f_ck off and die! Very well described,thank you.
Good analogy too for some big companies as well – thinking of my mobile phone service provider and no one else thanks.
Heading would have been less confronting if the word ‘active’ was in it!
J.
17 February 2017 at 1:50 pm in reply to: Psychoemotional ups and downs. Their associations with hepc #25332Matt, this made me remember the ‘circle of kindness’ youtube my daughter was shown in Kindy last year.
May have been posted here before, but what made me think is that when I started playing it, she came racing over and said:
“I know that, I love it ,,,,,, I hope I can be like that”.
Sure she will.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcBkgKrVaiU
Jeff
Hi Sven,
quite a nice letter about such good news.
All the best and thanks for sharing your journey.
Yours
Jeff
Hi all,
just another update while waiting around being retreated.
Had blood tests done December 2016 and all is okay barring any red blood cells still standing.
Had CT scan which I found out just before Christmas showed lesions (metastases?) near the liver – bit of a surprise and certainly a bit of a worry. Not a good Christmas at all.
So off to get a referral to the specilaist that took care of my HCC 4 years ago. Had an appointment scheduled but was advised before the appointment was due (on my birthday if you can believe it) that the lesions on their review were not metastases or anything really nasty.
Happy birthday though I think at times my head is being done in.
Still feel like shit at times with the Riba and went on two weeks leave around my birthday but caught this cough type cold thing which is still hanging around. Other people I know at work and someone at home have it as well, so I can’t finger this on the Riba. Coming up to finishing 5 months out of six re-treatment on DAAs.
Do not seem to hear much about the concern about DAA treatment reactivating previous HCCs now a days. Was this something of a flash in the pan or still something I can fill in the time worrying about while I wait?
Yours
Jeff
14 January 2017 at 3:36 am in reply to: Trump’s Plan to Cut Drug Imports Could Raise Prices, Not Lower #25007Hi Vororo,
I find the whole patent thing a bit strange now and it must be hard to work in companies like big pharma where the focus on developing something great, new and worthwhile, is suddenly changed to fart arseing around with mods to the drugs and using patents to get profits when you do.
I am typing this post on my 13 inch MacPro for which I understand Apple holds a patent for a rectangular aluminium case with round corners. My 27 inch iMac is with Apple Care as the bloody hinge is broken – a design fault probably made when Apple was looking after their patents rather then considering their cheap silly hinge was not strong enough to support the computer.
Another question is about charging what the market will bear – big pharma did this here in Aust and basically no one could afford it until eventually it was on the PBS. I suspect that over time this will be for a much reduced price anyway; not considering the year or so of lost sales because no one was buying.
Simple view I suppose.
Having used generics and the alleged real deal, I cannot fid the difference between them – aside from that Riba stuff being added in with retreatment. Using the PBS is obviously cheaper for me, but part of me still would prefer the government save themselves a quid, and give me (receipts have to be provided) a few thousand bucks and let me do my own thing with my doctor.
Just some thought from the again recently brain fogged and hopefully defogged.
Yours
Jeff
splitdog wrote:
There ya go, man! Let the viral slaughter commence!!!!Hi Splitdog,
I like it – I did not know I had a sadistic bent until my first lot of DAA’s gave the virus a good shellacking.
And get well soon sumblues!
Yours
Jeff
Hi RSF,
the more I experience being treated, the more convinced I am that the best way for anyone with Hep C to look after their liver, is to piss of the Hep C.
It appears Dr Freeman’s efforts with DAA’s are the primary way to do this; but I am also very open to ALL ways to look after what is left of the damaged liver HCV has left.
Re: evidence based – I hear a lot about this were I work too, but often wonder about the ‘evidence’, questioning whether it is simply a reflection of what is under someone’s nose at the time. Where I go for my liver, DAA treatment is alive and well, but me being retreated makes me feel like I am at the pointy end of a spear.
Yours
Jeff
Hi and congratulations,
you seem to be confirming my own view that no matter how bad things are life is better without Hep C.
It’s good to hear that even with the odds looking against someone, they did something and cleared the virus. Ballsy effort.
Re: “Sof/Dac PLUS in July Doc Freeman gave me a Baseball Bat to knock it out and It has WORKED A TREAT.” – would the ‘bat’ be Riba and how long ??
Yours with best wishes for a 2017 the system thought you may not see,
Jeff
P.S. good to hear from you too Archer.
Just an update that may make the outlook better for second treaters:
Started again beginning of October 2016.
By 4 weeks into treatment: LFTS down but still bit elevated, AFP normal, fatigue a bit down but general ‘don’t feel that good feeling’, moody ++ and lack of strength which was not there first time around on treatment – Ribavirin side effects? Results of detection test not available – big deal, I can wait.
By around 8 weeks: LFTS all normal, anything Ribavirin can affect blood wise is affected. AFP normal and now I am UND. Insomnia which was not there first time around has ceased; less feeling crook in the gut and the head feeling like I had one too many swampies last night has diminished as well.
Latest CT scan a work (wait) in progress.
Apart from feeling a bit off, good to be back in the saddle desexing Hep C virons; the least I can do for my loyal little friends. Maybe having the chance to breed a few more of them to neuter is some consolation too.
And many thanks for the posters, both those who have to have a second try, and these who get better first time around showing it ca be done.
And also the medicos who have stood by their patients for many years, often having to silently witness them pissing Interferon + Ribavirin into the wind for no good end. Hope the DAA’s have come as a welcome and well deserved relief.
And a big thanks for for Dr Freeman et. al. who first gave me (and many others) a taste of the good life back in late 2015. This was the first time I defeated the ‘have to wait’ tyranny, and fuck all mighty, that may me feel GOOD!
Yours all,
Jeff
Hi all,
I read the unedited post here which on the way through mentioned our Agent 86. I hope this is the post at least.
I have been having a maudlin time (never did like Ribavirin) and it got me thinking and thinking about Mike and some of the things I remember most on the way through are his always helpful input and the things he has done to get the focus on treatment for many who may not think it is possible.
I also remember him ‘outing’ himself a while back with a picture of himself among the tomatoes somewhere in ‘them thar’ Arkansas Hills (?). I thought Green Acres and American Gothic!
My main memory though is what Mike said when I posted I had relapsed. Like the Gettysburg Address, not one word too many, and not one word too less, in fact just one word, “Damn”. I just knew what he meant and it meant a lot to me.
If Hep C has one redeeming feature for me, then it is the ‘Mikes’ of this world, and an international assortment of others too many to mention whom inhabit here.
Yours with thanks
Jeff
“Hello forum
Reporting in after SVR24 etc a while back because I have an important query
Now that’s in my past and I have stepped back and re-evaluated my situation after losing my professional career to interferon after the patching up post cure such as $3,500 on teeth that were perfect pre peginf, having all scans and colonoscopy etc blah blah I have realised how much money this has cost me and I am forced to sell my home.”Hi Ariel,
I think it is hard to simply ‘move on’ after so much stuff having flowed under the bridge during a person’s life with HCV. For me I lost a lot, and maybe have more to loose as well in the future. But having said that, in a strange, perverse and circuitous sort of way I ended up with the family I wanted and cherish so dearly.
I found it worse when using DAA’s and feeling well again (factoring out old age) and realising what I had missed carrying this virus. No one really understood what having HCV was like – for that matter neither did I until I was rid of it for a while.
Still trying and looking forward to a SVR future whatever that holds for me. The only redemption (pardon the pun Dr Freeman) has been finding this site and getting treated even though the first time round it failed.
I don’t know what to say about repositioning the impact HCV has had on one’s life, post treatment. I think dealing with the emotional side of HCV is easier when you are fighting it – and you assess the damage after the battle is won.
I hope things work out for you, and again in a perverse way, you describing your distress has helped me make more sense of my own feelings and fears.
Yours
Jeff
Hi countless,
another question may be if it passes the blood brain barrier, is it able to cross both ways? That is reinfect the rest of the UND body?
Still think the DAAs must get into the brain because the brain fog (for me) seems to go when under treatment. Hard to tell this time round though with being re-treated as I am using Ribavirin as it has some poo-ey side effects of its own.
Last time round I did not get viral load tests done until 12 weeks after EOT so I don’t know whether the treatment failure was the virus making some heroic comeback after treatment, or had come back with a vengeance in the later stages of treatment. If after treatment, then I think if the scarring + BBB is making it harder for the DAAs to work, then even longer treatment (+ or – Ribavirn on the way through?) is indicated?
Maybe out of PBS guidelines, but then again there is generics?
yours
Jeff
“The presence of multidrug resistance proteins such as the P glycoprotein in the BBB provide a protective niche for the replication of virus by restricting the access of antiviral drugs in patients treated for HCV infection[45]. ”
Is this indicating longer period of treatment??
Similar to cirrhotic patients being harder to treat as the virus is harder for the DAAs to get at?
J.
17 October 2016 at 9:56 am in reply to: Greedfighter’s Generic Epclusa or Harvoni to USA Journal #23918 -
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