Hep c active or not?

[beckland]

Hi everyone,  I do have hep c. But I have a friend ask me about non active. She said her husband goes to a pain clinic and his blood work showed that his liver enzymes are elavated and he needs to see his family doctor. He went to his doc and he did blood work and he tested postive for hep c, but the doc said it is non active at this time. My question is , is that possible since his liver enzymes are elevated?  I use to see the same doc that he does and he wasnt very good so i told my friend to get a second opinion and i would ask y'all about it to. Please let me know.  Thanks

[beckland]

Thank you all for your information.  I am going to tell her all of what you said and stress how important it is to get a second opinion. Thanks

[Idyllic]

I was thinking the same thing Livelife just mentioned.  While it varies from lab to lab the reference interval for AST is (0 - 40) and ALT is (0 - 32). We don't know what the doctor considers normal or high for your friend's husband given he is on other medication.

To me even a positive HCV Antibody and elevated liver enzymes are enough to warrant testing for the virus itself. But you need more information. There is no way you can meaningfully guess when imprecise terminology is used. It is the term "nonactive" that does not make sense.

[Livelife777]

Hi Beck.   Your friend went to a pain clinic and could have elevated liver enzymes due to oxy meds which have acetaminophen in them.
Just a thought!
.....Kim

[can-do-man]

When you say their elevated do you know how high? There's many things that can cause this and yes chronic hep C is one of them. As pooh stated he needs to have a PCR done to see if he has a viral load

[flyinlynn]

Hi Beckland

The reference to active non active was from the1980's and was dropped a long time ago. Hepatitis c is a slowly acting chronic condition that to be eradicated requires treatment period.

Some people go through a noticeable acute phase of hep c where they have symptoms many do not experience any symptoms from initial infection.

After the initial phase about 25% are able to eliminate the virus on their own while the remainder go on to be chronic carriers who experience continuing ongoing silent attack by the virus against their livers.

It sounds like your friend’s family doctor is not current in his knowledge of hepatitis c. Your friend needs to be seen if not by a Hepatologist at least a gastroenterologist familiar in the treatment of patients with hepatitis C.

There are new treatments available now and coming soon that are much more tolerable than the old treatments, of greatly shorter duration and effectiveness approaching 100% depending on individual circumstances for example genotype and if the patient has developed cirrhosis.

For most the only way to know this is happening by the presence of chronically and often only slightly elevated liver enzyme tests and of course a positive test for the presence of the hepatitis c virus.

If he were my friend I would strongly encourage him to seek a second opinion.

Best of luck to you and your friend
Lynn

[beckland]

What about his liver enzymes being elavated?  Would that mean chronic or acute hep c?

[Idyllic]

I can only second what has been said so well and encourage you to follow your instincts ~ especially if that is how the doctor phrased what is going on with your friend's hubby.  Even more so since you say he tested positive for Hepatitis C.
There are so many people who come on here who have been grossly mislead by a family doctor. That is reason enough in my book to get a second opinion.

[pooh55811]

There is no such thing as inactive or nonactive Hepatitis C. One either has Hepatitis C or one does not have it.

Now, it is possible that there is some confusion concerning interpretation of the blood work that was done. It is also possible that your friend is misquoting the doctor or it is possible that the doctor does not know Hep C terminology very well or does not understand how Hep C actually works. (My PCP keeps charting that I have inactive Hep C. I do not. I attained SVR 2 years ago. However, she does not know that much about Hep C so she is not using the correct terminology and does not really understand it. Many PCPs know very little about Hep C or its terminology.)

It would help to know exactly what blood tests your friend had run.

If he had the Hepatitis C Antibody test, it would either show negative (meaning he had never been exposed to Hep C) or it could show positive (meaning that he had been exposed to Hepatitis C at some point in the past). If he had a positive Hep C Antibody test, then he would need to have an HCV RNA test run to determine if he has Chronic Hepatitis C or if his immune system was able to fight it off on its own.  If the HCV RNA test is Detectable (shows a viral load), then he has Chronic Hep C. If the HCV RNA test is Undetectable (shows no viral load) then he does not have Chronic Hep C.

So it is important to know which tests he had done.

Here is a link that explains the tests:

http://labtestsonline.org/understanding/analytes/hepatitis-c/tab/test/