Chronic Hepatitis B sympotoms

[WonderingHealth]

My boyfriend was recently diagnosed with chronic Hepatitis B. He is Vietnamese and contracted it from his mother at birth. He recently had a liver biopsy and his doctor said he looked pretty healthy and would not need any treatments at this point (he is 34). They will just monitor him.

On Wednesday of last week, he found a swollen lymph node under his jaw towards the front of his neck (it's localized and is only swollen on his neck). Over the past few days it has increased in size and is tender (painful) to touch. From Thursday to Saturday he became increasingly fatigued and had headaches whenever he moved (he remained pretty active on Thursday and Friday including basketball, running and softball). He went to the doctor's office on Monday and they are doing blood tests and said they would have results today (they called today to tell him that his doctor was out of the office and they'd call him tomorrow with results). As a note he was tested for all STDs in March and was clean (he tested 12 weeks after any possible exposure to anything). He was feeling slightly better yesterday, but continued fatigue and headaches today.

I guess my question is that can the fatigue be due to hepatitis B? Could he just have the flu and he's having more trouble clearing it because of hepatitis b, or is it possible he has mono or something more complex? I have been with him constantly for 5 months and I feel healthy and fine, so I (anecdotally) do not think it's contagious. Does anyone with Chronic Hepatitis B experience bouts of fatigue and headaches, similarly?

Thank you for your time.

[stef2011]

Is the biopsy a reliable course of action?
it tells everythin so if hbvdna comes und and alt normal it is not hbv

anybody i know as cronic carrier never had synthoms, only friends who cleared it had mild synthoms like yellow skin, dark urine, a litttle fatigue

[WonderingHealth]

Thanks for the reply. So in your experience it sounds like his symptoms are unrelated to having HBV? That's good to know. They did some bloodwork so hopefully we'll receive his results today to see what's happening.

What's a fibroscan? Or is there a thread that outlines what a person who has been recently diagnosed should do? My boyfriend only had bloodwork and a biopsy. Is the biopsy a reliable course of action? Thanks again.

[stef2011]

I guess my question is that can the fatigue be due to hepatitis B?
yes but severe abnormal is very rare on cronic, especially those with mother transmission.Usually only acute hbv has mild synthoms, on cronic you don t feel anything since liver works normally till close to death

as to your boyfriend it is difficult those synthoms are related to hbv if liver was ok.as an example i have cirrhosis but all blood tests are normal and i feel perfectly normal, only fibroscan or US can detect cirrhosis